Theatre
WEST END TOUR
THE LETTER
King’s Theatre, Edinburgh, Mon 26 Feb—Sat 3 Mar
Ah. I can hear the sweets rattling now. There's nothing like an old fashioned West End-style thriller to lighten the load of a long theatre season. and Somerset Maugham’s tale of tropical intrigue might just fit the bill. The frequently-refereiiced heat of the setting certainly plays a role in the passions on display in this classic. though it might take a shift of imagination to sense it in an Edinburgh February.
Maugham's potboiler is a piece which. having been regularly performed since the 19208. isn't to be lightly dismissed. See if you can name at least a dozen films. aside from the three celluloid versions of the piece itself. that have magpied the plot. Set in a steamy outpost of the empire. it sees a woman kill a man apparently intent upon sexually assaulting her. Her husband employs the best defence lawyers. but then a letter is discovered revealing that the dead man was perhaps her lover.
Maugham must have seen enough plots that borrowed this scenario to drive him. er. Raj. With housewives favourite Anthony Andrews (no matter how many movies he's made. will he ever outshine his Sebastian Flyte?) and Jenny Seagrove as the star fodder. this might be a good night out. (Steve Cramer)
ADAPTATION TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD
King’s Theatre, Edinburgh, Tue 20 Feb-Sat 24 Feb
To Kil/ A Mocking Bird was the pretty near universal novel for teenagers at school. The film version saw Gregory Peck turned into an icon of integrity and justice. So much so. in fact. that Peck would later do his Atticus Finch in front of a Senate hearing on the subject of whether Frank Sinatra and his notorious pals were fit to be granted gaming licences. and persuade the learned panel that they were. But a production from Birmingham Rep. a company famously committed to issues of racial equality and multiculturalism. will clearly be more than a museum piece evoking a nostalgic past.
The story. for those of you who either didn't go to high school or have a phobia about Mr Peck. focuses on the coming of age of two children. Scout and Jem. whose father. attorney Atticus finds himself defending a black man unjustly accused of raping a white woman. Together this social drama sees thorn pitted against an entire system that doesn't see itself as racist, and so proceeds to label Atticus and his family as crazy radicals simply bent on causing trouble. The whole point about Harper Lee’s Pulit7er Prize winning novel is that racism is invisible to those that practice it — it simply seems reasonable to the townsfolk that they should behave like a lynch mob.
Perhaps this is why it appeals to the folk at Birmingham Rep. They‘ve produced a lot of work about how prejudice is a part of a mainstream system. where the media. news and our very language causes a blindness to it. That. subsequently. Lee's 1960 novel has been condemned by some post-colonial critics as patronising to its central black character. Tom Robinson. is something that might provoke debate to this day. Whether it's a latter day Unc/e Tom's Cabin. where white people intervene in black people's problems to sort them out. is at best a moot point. But what is unquestionable is that this adaptation by Christopher Sergei is relevant in condemning what we don't see as
racism. (Steve Cramer)
84 THE LIST if) f (2t) 71 Mar 7007'
CLASSIC
MRS WARREN’S PROFESSION
Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh, Fri 16 Feb-Sat 10 Mar
Much of what passes for love these days is really about economics. Which of us hasn’t heard a man or woman criticise their loved one’s ‘lack of ambition’ in lieu, in fact, of a shortage of cash. In a society where so much of our emotional life is really about transaction, it’s no wonder that prostitution continues to thrive.
In Bernard Shaw’s classic, here directed by Tony Cownie, young Vivie Warren, an educated and privileged young career woman of the early 20th century discovers that her mum has, in fact, progressed from a prostitute to a wealthy brothel owner. The fallout from this is both funny and politically observant, if ultimately grim.
Paola Dionisotti, a TV and film regular, plays Mrs Warren, and Emma Stansfield (Ronnie from Coronation Street) plays her daughter Vivie.
‘lt’s about capitalism,’ says Dionisotti. ‘As long as women in a capitalist system are seen to be
commodities there’s a problem. The recent prostitutes’ murders in Ipswich shows it’s still deep rooted, in women too - a belief in a form of behaviour in the female of the sex which puts them beyond the pale,
and at that point there are a whole different set of rules.
‘In the 19th century, and ever since, a great deal of legislation has been passed, much of which was about eliminating prostitution altogether, but since nothing was done about the core point about eliminating the commodification of people, nothing changed.’
Stansfield adds: ‘These days the porn industry is one of the biggest industries we have; because it’s taboo, people are willing to pay so much money for it.’ Stansfield’s character chooses to reject such values, but seems to become emotionally cold in sacrificing career for emotion. ‘She isn’t terribly aware of her sexuality, it isn’t important to her. She doesn’t weep at the end of the play, because she sees that as a feminine tool, and she isn’t going to cheapen herself with it.’ This piece promises a night of thoughtful humour for all. (Steve Cramer)