Second year acting students from Arden School of Theatre once again were tasked in tackling the most popular and perhaps only known work of Swiss playwright and dramatist, Friedrich Duerrenmatt. However this is a greatly adapted and updated version thanks to Ed Jones, as the contemporary references, swearing, and bringing the play to a northern English town are all his. The theatre has been completely transformed too; rather than the usual seating we are now in a thrust theatre space with the audience seated on two sides of the largest acting area I have seen in a long while. A whole town has been created on the theatre's floor, in a similar way one would expect a TV Soap Opera studio to be laid out. A street runs through the middle, and the hostel, police station, grocery store, mayor's house, park, railway station etc are all clearly marked and effectively dressed on either side. One can imagine a camera crew following the actors as they move around this set. IT works, and works well, but perhaps it was just a little too large, since when the action happened in a part of the acting area furthest from me, I felt very distanced and detached from it, which I am sure was not the director's intention since the action would have been close to other audience members seated on the opposite side.
James Mair's direction otherwise, was flawless. His vision, taking much inspiration from the theatre practices and techniques of Berthold Brecht and Duerrenmatt himself, was consistent and imaginative throughout, and the students responded to his directing with alacrity. In fact, after consideration, I feel that this production has to be one of the most mature and professional I have seen the acting students of Arden School produce for a long time. It took me a while to get to grips with the play, I have to admit. The costuming from almost every period in history from 1800 onwards, the varying accents, and the self-mocking bravura style took me by surprise a little.
'The Visit' (originally in German, it was 'The Visit Of A Lady'), tells the story of the return to the town of Guellen (Swiss German dialect for diarrhetic excrement - a joke that is lost in the English translation) of the extremely rich Claire Zachanassian, who, as a youth was a resident of this town and had an affair with the grocer, Alfie. Alfie is now married and a very popular member of the town's social life. However, Claire, realising the town has fallen on hard times and in desperate need of an injection of money to revive it, decides that - perhaps out of jealousy, perhaps just because she is bored and this is a sport for her - she shall give the town £2 billion, if they murder Alfie. She cast spurious charges in court, and although the townsfolk are convinced she is lying, the question is, will they or won't they kill Alfie for such a large injection of cash to the town and their own personal pockets? What is the human condition and what does greed do to you? Using lots of nicely choreographed dance routines (Charlotte Bushell), with the cast miming the songs, Brecht's 'Verfremdungseffekt' was used deftly, and with some effective lighting (Chris Bowler), Mair cleverly placed the humour of the piece nicely sandwiched between the the serious and perhaps contentious, never allowing us to dwell on the morals, but simply enjoy the spectacle, allowing us in on the action, since we know, just as the actors know, that they are actors and performing for us. (again, all Brecht and 'Epic Theatre' - Duerenmatt himself was, like Brecht, interested in developing this form of theatre!)
The cast was large, 30 actors and actresses in total, and so it is impossible to mention all. However, full and due credit must be given to the protagonists Jake Watters (Alfie), and Madeleine Scragg (Claire); both worked excellently giving lovely performances. But, if I might be a little subjective, forgive me, my personal favourite characterisations this afternoon came from Ciaran Lockwood's Mayor, Dario Bastos Junior's Priest, and Briony Chambers-Asman's Sister Bernadette. However, this was a fully ensemble production with all 30 cast members pulling and pushing in time with each other bringing about, as I have already stated, a very proficient and professional production. Highly enjoyable.
Reviewer - Alastair Zyggu
on - 18.3.25
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