Acting is royal calibre in ‘future history’ of the British monarchy
King Charles III ★★★ (out of 4) Written by Mike Bartlett, directed by Joel Greenberg. Until March 4 at the CAA Theatre (formerly the Panasonic), 651 Yonge St. mirvish.com, 416-872-1212 and 1-800-461-3333
At last: a cure for The Crown withdrawal.
If you’ve finished binge-watching Season 2 of the Netflix hit and are hungry for more behind-the-scenes-with-the-royals intrigue, get thee to the CAA Theatre for Mike Bartlett’s ingenious and edgy “future history play.”
You’ll not meet the current monarch there. The play starts, daringly enough, at her funeral. While The Crown thus far has depicted a fictionalized version of events that have already happened Bartlett’s play begins with the ascension of the current Prince of Wales to the throne. Joel Greenberg ’s production doesn’t look as lavish as one would hope, but fine performances from the 12-member ensemble and good pacing do justice to the intelligence and complexity of Bartlett’s script, first produced in London in 2014, acclaimed on the West End and Broadway, and turned into a 2017 BBC TV drama.
Kicking off with the death of the current beloved monarch is only the beginning of Bartlett’s risks. He’s also written the play mostly in blank verse and created a convincing scenario in which Britain is thrown into a full-bore crisis when the new King Charles (David Schurmann) opposes a privacy bill that has passed through Parliament. Never imagined a tank parked in front of Buckingham Palace? Now’s your chance.
You have to do a surprising amount of imagining around this Studio 180 Theatre production, part of the off-Mirvish season. The design is disappointingly threadbare: John Thompson’s set, of stairs leading up to a raised area where most of the action is played, is plain and stark, and Kevin Fraser’s simple projection effects do little to suggest changes of location and mood.
Thomas Ryder Payne’s sound is made to do most of the heavy lifting when, for example, the action moves to Boujis nightclub, but it’s still jarring when the actors playing Prince Harry (Wade Bogert-O’Brien) and his buddies (Marcel Stewart and Sam Kalilieh) start passing around bottles of expensive booze and talking smack.
And Rosemary Dunsmore’s pitchperfect Camilla deserves better than the ill-fitting dress she wears throughout; the bulk of Denyse Karn’s costume budget appears to have been spent on the impressive military regalia of Charles and William (Jeff Meadows) and a final coronation scene that delivers proper pomp.
What makes the play so rich is that it moves well beyond the familiar binary opinions on the royals: that they’re either an outdated and undemocratic waste of money, or important figureheads and sources of inspiration.
Bartlett takes the fact that these people are already so familiar and puts that at the heart of the play’s intrigue. The national crisis is all about the power of mainstream and social media, which the prime minister (Gray Powell) is looking to curtail. But Charles defends the freedom of the press and its role in holding institutions to account, egged on by the Conservative leader of the opposition (Patrick Galligan). The arguments are rich and the merits of each side get aired.
The play openly aspires to the Shakespearean in its five-act structure, focus on royalty and use of lan- guage, but previous critics’ likening of Kate to Lady Macbeth reduces the complexity of her character: she’s less power-hungry than pragmatic and feminist.
While Schurmann seemed initially rushed in his opening night performance, he settled well into the fabulously well-written title role.
Bartlett’s language lurches sometimes between the formal and the noticeably colloquial, but the training and skill of the company (which also includes Guy Bannerman and Amy Rutherford) make their speaking in verse a pleasure to hear.
The real-life situation that undergirds the play, of course, is the fact that Charles has waited a very long time for his shot at the throne, and some believe his best move would be to step aside in favour of the youthful and photogenic William and Kate. As when I watch The Crown I found myself simultaneously wondering how the royals themselves would respond to this dramatization of their lives and marvelling at the world we live in, in which such artistic speculation is not just acceptable but wildly popular.
The fact that Bartlett’s play both exploits this and reflects critically on it, through its focus on media and representation, is part of what makes it such a rewarding and thought-provoking evening.