|
 Yesterday I went to see Brighton Rock and took a friend - what an amazing production! As we sat having a drink before the performance, my friend said: "I wouldn't like to play Pinkie, were I a man. How can you step into the shoes of Sir Richard Attenborough?" As we left, she said she was withdrawing this view - Joe Davidson, she said, was much better looking and looked as if he would be able to seduce someone. He also managed to offer a really scarey and menacing performance - and she was correct.
As Richards' performance was stupendous -- she was spot on as the slightly busybody Ida and Evie Depledge managed, as Rose, to lose several years and present perfectly the ingenue who is taken in by Pinkie. I remember how it was to be 16 or 17 (somewhere in the dim and distant past) and Ms. Depledge portrayed this perfectly. I am Roman Catholic and Graham Green's Catholicism has sometimes been a problem with me. However, Rose's innocence, tinged with good old Catholic guilt, was just perfection to behold. James Stephen Finn's Cubitt gave a master class in acting drunk. Bob Hough's Spicer was a type of man who is seen left often now -- but who was seen often in the '50s (I am not old enough to remember the '40s but remember friends of my father's and grandparents' who were just like this but who were, as far as I know, not gangsters -- and David Wainwright's Dallow/Jim would fit right into some of the less salubrious venues in Hackney (even though the London Borough of Hackney is now such a desirable place to be!). Richard Ings' handling of the various parts he played was excellent and Suki Rees's performance(s) as Mrs. Colleoni/Manager/Mother were most enjoyable -- particularly when noting the differences in the character of Mrs. Colleoni and the Mother. The other players were also very good. How difficult it must be to jump from being one character into being another (or two others).
As I said above, I am ancient -- one of the dresses that Cerys Puccetti wore was exactly the same as one my mother had, with a very slightly different pattern. If I were to be picky, I would say that the costumes were not quite right. The heels on many of the shoes were not of the era and Mr. Pruitt was wearing suede boots -- a no-no at that time. Some of the men's clothes were not cut in the style of the era. One suspects that Pinkie's hair would have been shorter (has anyone else noticed how male footballers today seem to have gone back to 1940s and 1950s hairstyles?) Ida's outfit seemed to be Crimplene -- which wasn't around then. As I said, I am picky!
The sound, lighting and scenery were all round excellent. It never ceases to amaze me how The Tower can manage to produce scenery that, while usually so simple, is so adaptable to the script. For Brighton Rock, this was a particularly apposite viewpoint. The rusty pier became a house interior, a restaurant, the honeymoon bed and a stand at the races. The lighting that led us to believe that there was water behind it was a really good effect.
I have seen the Attenborough film many times (although not recently -so I will go back to it) and I have always enjoyed it, but I actually preferred The Tower's version. Congratulations to the whole team --- it was really a very good production. I would add that the house Shiraz was also most quaffable. That the theatre was so full on a night one can only describe as having disgusting weather (I arrived soaking wet) should also be taken as a compliment to the quality that is now expected in Tower productions. Well done all!
Photography by Ahmed Kamara
|
