Dame Maggie’s terrifyingly good as a little old Nazi . . .
AS yOU file into this new play, expectations stratospherically buoyed by the name, the reputation and the solidly bankable pulling power of Dame Maggie Smith, it doesn’t seem much to look at.
We see a quaint living room, an ageing kitchen, a bright streak of morning sun and a round table cluttered in the kind of manic way only pensioners’ tables are.
After a dip into darkness, she’s there. The Nazi. It doesn’t take long for the Dame’s unrivalled ability — and Christopher hampton’s disturbingly complex text — to ensnare you totally.
This 90-minute monologue, directed by Jonathan Kent, is drawn from an interview with Brunhilde Pomsel when she was 102: one of the last living witnesses to the creation, decline and fall of Nazi Germany. She’s mostly cardigan now, but in her heyday Brunhilde was a secretary working for Joseph Goebbels.
hers is a different telling of history. ‘Politics’ doesn’t interest her. She’s incredibly competent at her job and reels off endless detail, until we get to the Nazi horror. That’s when her memory falters.
Maggie Smith is perfect. her performance is seductively natural. She roughs the text up beautifully with little slips, ‘umms’ and stuttery repetitions. her eyes are soft and tired, but when she tells of a dramatic bombing and fire I could feel my heart racing.
There’s so much variety of expression, gesture and pace. All from a dining room chair. This is a master storyteller at work.
And it’s a chilling story. The language so delicately reveals her sinister selfishness. Jews ‘emigrated’ from Germany rather than fled for their lives. Concentration camps were for ‘education’. her initial qualm about joining the Nazis was the ‘ten marks’ admission fee.
For days, this complex portrait has been rattling around my head. To hold a room, to deliver this feat of memory, isn’t the impressive bit. Michael McIntyre can do that. This was to charm us — and then chill us — in the most casual manner.
I’ll be telling people about Dame Maggie’s quiet, devastatingly effective performance for years.