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Stars explained: * A production of no real merit
with failings in all areas. ** A production showing evidence of not
enough time or effort, or even talent, and which never breathes any real
life into the piece – or a show lumbered with a terrible script. *** A
good enjoyable show which might have some small flaws but has largely
achieved what it set out to do.**** An excellent show which shows a
great deal of work and stage craft with no noticeable or major
flaws.***** A four star show which has found that extra bit of magic
which lifts theatre to another plane. |
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Tensions mount among
the young: Chris (Jimmy Proctor), George (George Heynes) and his sister
Ann (Julie-Ann Randell). Pictures:
Richard Smith
Photograpy All My Sons
The Loft Theatre, Leamington
***** THE Loft has a
wondrous gift for delivering professional standards across a wealth of
repertoire: tragedy, comedy, historical. But stumbling across Arthur
Miller’s second play and first triumph
All My Sons
was a particular revelation for director Gus MacDonald. ‘When I see a play
described as a “classic of its time” I tend to think’, says MacDonald,
‘of something “worthy” that was good in its day but is probably now well
past its sell-by date and high in its yawn factor’. But when a few years
ago he saw the latest production in London of
All My Sons,
he admits, ‘I was totally knocked out by the whole thing.’ Now MacDonald himself has given us another treasure from the Loft, directing a new staging of All My Sons that looks good, is intimate, edge of seat and profoundly intense and gripping. The story centres round Joe Keller (Tom
O’Connor), a self-made American minor tycoon who has a grim secret. He
himself authorised the shipping out to the USAF of some 21 aeroplane
cylinder heads, which caused the crash of 21 US fighters and pilots. Joe
shamefully lumped all the blame on his number two, his friend, colleague
and neighbour Steve Deever, who still languishes in prison, unjustly,
for the crime. Meanwhile the latter’s daughter, Ann, is prevented from
marrying the Kellers’ younger son, Chris, because the mother, Kate,
fervently refuses to believe that Larry, her elder son and a wartime
pilot, now lost, is dead: ‘She’s Larry’s girl’. First praise to Richard Moore’s engaging set
design. With astroturf lawn, an impressive wooden slatted house
frontage, garden door entrance, twin levels, fencing and solid side
gates, it looks the part exactly: it provides a compact, enclosed, at
times suitably stifling outdoor area that serves the grim domestic
tragedy being played out on stage extremely well. Miller elected for ten roles, although one, the
small boy Bert, was here essentially cut (apart from a voice calling
over the fence): a pity, arguably, as the scenes with Bert give Keller a
chance to lighten and brighten, to engage in play acting and irony that
enhances and broadens his character. Four lesser roles, two pairs of
neighbours, bring contrast: Mark Crossley as the delightfully loopy
Frank Lubey, Claire Bradwell as the splendidly dozy but open-eyed Lydia,
who has borne him (I think) four rampaging children and who underlines
the aura of trust that permeates Act I. Of the other neighbours, Jim
Bayliss (Dave Crossfield) is a doctor, perceptive, and guessing the
truth, but supportive, who should perhaps be smoking a pipe. Angie
Collins as his verging on bitchy wife, Sue, brings her character
forcefully alive when she engages in a verbal punch up in Act 2 with the
young Ann, a powerful scene powerfully done.
At the centre of everything, somewhat static as
the family and neighbourly fairground goes on around him, is Joe Keller
(Tom O’Connor). Keller is amiable, family minded, somewhat bluff, a
typical American paterfamilias and troublingly smug self-made man. He
has indeed bluffed his way out of the crisis that put his partner in
jail; are there lingering doubts evident in the first half? Is he really
insecure? ‘Joe McGuts’, his son admiringly calls him, and he certainly
has a nerve. He looks unshakable. Perhaps Keller needed to be more mobile,
dominating the stage and not just part of it, pacing the property to
make his mark: when he describes returning, acquitted, and walking down
the street to cries of ‘murderer’, he really does need to strut and
swagger, not merely to recall it. But O’Connor’s at times fractionally
subdued or quiescent interpretation did have a major bonus: we were on
his, and Joe’s, side, and, till the unexpected end, we really do believe
in Joe: we like him. It makes the ending, and the gunshot, all the more
searing. The Director’s wife, Mary MacDonald, takes the
role of Kate Keller, Joe’s wife. Kate’s most telling set piece comes
early in the play. At the outset, rain is pouring down frontstage – a
plus for the effects department – and a storm breaks quite dramatically:
a good idea (the text does not insist on it, but alludes back) that
captures the tense atmosphere straight away, as with a lightning flash
and ominous crash the tree – ‘Larry’s tree’ – tumbles down. Kate – here,
the first character we see - has seen it fall at night. Her vivid dream has been about Larry: ‘I could
almost reach out and touch him’. It’s a deeply emotive, and essential,
speech, and Mary MacDonald coming frontstage gives it her best. Mother,
and her belief in Larry’s survival, plays a key role throughout the
play, right till the denouement and the crucial letter which Ann
produces, indicating Larry’s belief in his father’s guilt, and probable
suicide. Just possibly Kate is not only the generous-hearted American
mum, but a little more deranged and depressive than this. But the whole
cast were on edge on her appearance, and hung on her every word, longing
– though they could not - to appease her. In a way Miller shines the light on the next, the
younger, generation: Larry from the outset, and at the close; Ann’s
brother George (George Heynes) is in a sense the Angel of Death, who
hears from his father’s lips the truth of Joe’s guilt that will dominate
the last scenes. Heynes found the right kind of bottled up anger – in
Act 2 you could see him seething underneath – and also the boyishness in
his twenties which is about to yield to the cajolings and old warmth he
in childhood felt for the Keller family.
In a way George, who has come in a fury to remove
his sister, is restricted in what he can do: he is, like Joe but for
different reasons, rather bolted to the spot. Perhaps he needed to
elaborate his stance, vary his reaction and gestures; perhaps not.
Certainly his task is to put Joe on the wrong foot, rattled, fighting,
finally on the defensive. We at last witness the real Keller under
pressure. Arguably the extra special member of this notable
team is Julie-Ann Randell, playing Ann Deever, daughter of the
imprisoned Steve. Every time Ann waltzes onto the stage, the atmosphere
lifts. Beautifully and aptly dressed (wardrobe: Mary MacDonald), she
lightens everything with her magical touch: her affectionate scenes with
Chris are delicate and absorbing, her breezy fondness for Joe enlivens
his day, her moves are free and flowing, her touching care and fondness
for Kate - even when being berated for her proposed marriage to Chris -
and her irrepressible joy and good humour, all bring a splendid change
and variety to the events unfolding – even though she is at the centre
of them. Which leaves another pleasing performance, from
Jimmy Proctor as Chris. Chris is a tricky role to play: in some ways,
his changes of mood and allegiance are more subtle than other
characters’: Proctor gives us the loyalty, the urge to heal wounds, the
fond banter with his dad, the dedication to his mother, and the
surrogate love for Ann which we see grow and blossom as the play moves
on. Chris, the innocent, more than anyone is
beleaguered by events; a searcher after truth in the belief it will be
bring a safe result: that the worst has happened (Larry’s death) and
that no other disaster is lurking. A brisk showing from Chris is needed
to shift the play, and the plot, along, and all this he brings. In a
sense you could say that he has captured Chris. And that’s no mean
achievement. Gus MacDonald proved his point. He gave us a
classic production of what is indeed, ‘a classic of its time’: and of
all time. To 18-02-17 Roderic Dunnett 09-02-17 |
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