Top Marx for the venue - and Karl’s capital, too
FOR ONCE, the play is not really the thing. London’s theatreland has an exciting new venue: the Bridge Theatre, on the South Bank of the Thames next to Tower Bridge.
It has been opened by former Royal National Theatre boss Sir Nicholas Hytner and his colleague Nick Starr, and they intend to operate without public subsidies. Good for them.
Their opening show, Young Marx, may not be earth- shatteringly deep, but it is perfectly watchable and has several moments of whimsy, as you would expect from writer Richard ‘One Man, Two Guvnors’ Bean.
Set in 1850, it tells us about Karl Marx’s chaotic life in London’s Soho as a thirtysomething writer. When not in the reading room of the British Library, Marx spent his time drinking, smoking cigars, pacifying his (aristocratic but penurious) wife, Jenny, and avoiding creditors. With all those debts to local traders and with the bailiffs taking away his furniture, it is perhaps no wonder he disliked capitalism. Mr Bean and his co-writer Clive Coleman give all this a frisky treatment. Much though I enjoyed its pace and chattiness, the play is unsatisfyingly shallow. One yearns to know more about Marx’s experience of workers’ daily grind ( his friend Friedrich Engels, a libidinous son of privilege, has greater knowledge of the miseries of the Victorian workhouse).
Where is Marx’s attitude to Judaism, if that was important? How does this devoted young dad square his adultery with his belief in comradely respect for the ill-used Jenny?
It’s a surprise that Bean and Coleman do not insert a flick of ruefulness at the fact that such a vibrantly egotistical individual went on to write the core text of dreary, lifeflattening Communism. THE
BRIDGE’S auditorium is cavernous, quite boxy, with generous side-galleries and an uncluttered view of the stage. Getting in and out of the stalls takes a while (narrow doorways). The foyer is broad with warm lighting and a long bar.
Rory Kinnear is on sprightly form as Marx, almost unrecognisable in a beard and a Mick Hucknall hairdo.
Mr Kinnear does what he can with his part. I came away thinking even more highly of his acting because he was so different from his normal roles, but the part is underwritten when it comes to the anger and seriousness that must have smouldered in Marx.
Nancy Carroll plays Jenny, Oliver Chris is a diffident Engels and Tony Jayawardena’s Dr Schmidt is a figure of older cynicism. The youngsters playing Marx’s children on Tuesday were excellent but few of the characters are much more than cartoons.
The humour is Blackadderish. After a drunken encounter with a Peeler, Marx and Engels thank the officer for not hitting them. ‘Yeah well,’ says the policeman, ‘I’ve been on a course.’
Some may say the Bridge should have opened with a heftier play. However, Young Marx makes for a perfectly agreeable evening and this is a commercial house, not some nationalised pumping- station of political orthodoxy.
Director Hytner will surely attempt more intellectual material, but it seems a fair idea to open his fine new venue with a determinedly unpompous, refreshing take on the 19thcentury’s most influential thinker. Good luck to the Bridge and all who sail under her.
TOM KEMPINSKI’S Duet For One has come round again. First seen in 1980, this two-hander is set entirely in the study of a London psychiatrist, Dr Feldmann. The story unfolds during a series of consultations he has with a top violinist, Stephanie.
Stephanie’s international career has been torpedoed by multiple sclerosis, and she has trouble coming to terms with the anguish and rage this causes. Although she can still walk a little, she spends most of the play in an electrically-operated wheelchair.
Dr Feldmann also sits a lot. You may gather that this, with the introspective nature of the dialogue (they are
talking about Stephanie’s feelings), makes for a static, claustrophobic evening. Those interested in psychoanalysis will be in their element. Others may find it a snoozy couple of hours.
Oliver Cotton gives us a handsome, beaky, hard-to-read Feldmann. He has problems of his own. The best moment in the play is a second-half speech in which Feldmann explodes against his ever-lurking enemy, suicide.
Stephanie is played by Belinda Lang, who gallantly stepped in late after Jemma Redgrave withdrew owing to poor health. Hats off to Miss Lang, but she struggles. The voice is a monotone and I was not remotely convinced when Stephanie — who drifts from her musician husband — describes an affair with a scrap-metal merchant.
Miss Lang’s attempts to walk in a faltering manner are no more persuasive. And seldom have so many profanities felt so prudish.
It has long been supposed that the play was based on cellist Jacqueline du Pre. In the programme, playwright Kempinski says this is ‘wrong, not so, fake news’. He asserts that the play is ‘a metaphor for my life’ and explains that he had long struggled to hide his depression and anxiety.