On paper, this play probably should not work. Based on the extensive list of letters exchanged between celebrated playwright George Bernard Shaw and the less well-known (outside of theatrical circles) Mrs Patrick Campbell, and adapted expertly by Jerome Kilty, it seemed likely to be long on literature and short on action. A simple two-hander – with the parts here played by Alan Turkingham and Rachel Pickup on a small but cleverly staged set – the scenario seemed at first glance to be static. How deceiving first impressions can be.
For static, read spellbinding. This is a play that works on multiple levels. Although the actors are primarily reciting and resurrecting a set of letters, rescued from a hatbox just before the Second World War, covering the professional, personal and occasionally political lives of these two individuals – with additional dialogue blended in seamlessly by Kilty, to the point that it was neither clear nor necessary to know who had written what – the quality of their performances and the wittiness of the words holds your attention throughout the brisk 110 minute run time. In fact, like a quality game of tennis, it was difficult to know who to watch – the character reading to us about the various events and incidents that had made up their flirtatious, occasionally frustrating, sometimes fraught but always full lives or the character on the receiving end, responding instinctively and emotionally to what they are hearing, be it acidic assessment or plaintive plea. With scenes moved on cleverly by the sound of a typewriter – underlining the literary theme – or the simple movement of a curtain (this worked particularly well in the beach sequence, where Shaw ignores her request for isolation – ‘solitude is wasted on your own’ – and gatecrashes her getaway) – the play covers a lot of ground.
And offers us a war, however warm and witty at times, between genders, between theatrical roles – the actor and the writer, with its own particular tension – and particularly for control, with key moments in their real lives echoing the staged relationship between Professor Henry Higgins and Eliza Doolittle, two of Shaw’s most famous characters, firstly from Pygmalion (performed here in two extended and entertaining sections, in rehearsal – in effect, a play within a play, and a two for one deal) and then immortalised on screen in My Fair Lady. There is an imbalance within their relationship that only worsens as the years go on, the play covering the span of their personal and professional relationship against the backdrop of two actual wars. In Pickup’s hands, Beatrice (referred to by Shaw as Stella but professionally by her husband’s name) is both touching and touchy, aware, as a woman, that her career may be more limited, accepting the role of Eliza, even though she struggles with the Cockney accent (played to great humour here) and is too old for the part (at one point she refers to her age as 39, undercutting it beautifully by noting she has a 28 year old daughter). Her theatrical triumphs, in the UK and US, are largely forgotten now and, at the end of her life, she cuts a somewhat tragic figure, having lost two husbands and a son, supported primarily by a succession of Pekinese dogs. Actresses even now will see the poignancy in her story, her attempts at creative control limited by her gender, her age and (even more so) the times in which she lived.
Shaw is a titan of the theatrical world, with too many credits to list – although some are namechecked in the play – and a reputation that lives on to this day. Not only a celebrated writer, but a political figure of note, with a socialist stance against the futility of war. Turkington captures the complex essence of the man, both petty and principled, occasionally pompous and, in effect, controlling, whether in the rehearsal room, with regard to her own memoir (where she wants to use letters he has sent her, but is effectively censored by Shaw in a noted outburst of anger), even with regard to her narrative overall (he notes towards the end of the play how much better he could have made her, if he had been allowed to write her story – how very Henry Higgins of him). In a key scene, as the real war intrudes with the tragic death of her son, the contradictions in Shaw’s character are cleverly exposed – while she mourns on one side of the stage, reaching out to her friend to read the letter explaining her son’s death, he mutters and moans from the other, swaddled in self-importance, complaining of the lack of paper, whether people will still read his sonnets and then, dogmatic and deaf to her pain, uses the incident to make a principled stance against the war.
It is a ‘war’ that both win here. Her reputation is revived, her achievements acknowledged, her own wit (telling Shaw early in their exchanges that, if only someone had told him to shush when he was younger, we would all benefit now) on display to match his. His reputation – for weighty, worthy works – is also enhanced by a brilliant display of brevity and wit, the play peppered with funny remarks and catty asides, notably about her husbands. This is because, even with the moments of seriousness creeping in – her accident, the death of his mother, beautifully rendered in a letter about her cremation that is both articulate and amusing, the inevitability of age – this is, at heart, a love story. And, as Valentine’s Day approaches, what better time to stage it. Go see this surprisingly funny, always emotional literary enterprise. You will not be disappointed - and will head out into the February rain uplifted by the experience.
It runs until 7 March.
Review: David Brown Photo: David Monteith-Hodge