![]() The room where Higgins teaches is an actual laboratory a spotlight frames him as he delivers a lecture on phonetics he teaches Eliza by hitting mint-coloured boards covered in diagrams with a metal pointer that he wields like a general. That surface deliberately, in Stewart Laing’s set, resembles a sounding board, its pinkish walls pitted with holes, on which the entire cast run hither and thither driven by Will Stuart’s relentless and intrusive piano score. Because they are such brilliant performers, they produce great moments of humour – but they are given no room to develop anything below the surface. Yet here the frenetic pace that Jones dictates means they become caricatures, with no breathing space to suggest depth or subtlety, relying on physical comedy and broad effects. This is a terrible shame because in Patsy Ferran and Bertie Carvel it stars two of the most interesting actors working today. ![]() It seems almost to dislike the play it is reviving. It is so worried about being different and modern that it sacrifices Shaw’s meaning, and his deep-felt examination of the effects of accent on class and class on English society. The Lerner and Loewe musical sits on top of George Bernard Shaw’s original play like a glamorous hat, lending its familiar lines a jaunty gloss.Īnd the problem with Richard Jones’ production of Shaw’s tale of Eliza Doolittle, the flower girl passed off as a duchess by phonetics expert Professor Henry Higgins, is that it seeks so hard to distance itself from the romantic musical interpretation it becomes brittle and heartless. The problem for Pygmalion is My Fair Lady. ![]() Michael Gould (Colonel Pickering), Patsy Ferran (Eliza Doolittle) and Bertie Carvel (Henry Higgins), © Manuel Harlan ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |