tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7200658218238769688.post5525975877865327061..comments2024-01-20T16:46:43.636+11:00Comments on Kevin Jackson's Theatre Diary: Mrs Warren's ProfessionGeorge Khuthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220918958933755405noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7200658218238769688.post-68993004021937768022013-03-31T01:43:32.167+11:002013-03-31T01:43:32.167+11:00What a play this is - how it intrigues you from th...<br /> What a play this is - how it intrigues you from the outset, and then throws down the gauntlet to conventional morality and to claims of progressiveness too. As you suggest, Kevin, nothing has dated in the challenge posed by Mrs Warren's choices in life. She is the woman of mystery around whom dance a clutch of fascinated friends, and when she chooses to cast off a customary veil her proud partners stumble in the attempt to keep up. Shaw sets up confrontation after confrontation in which his characters - their green and pretty world suddenly splattered with mud - chafe at their vulnerability and pull whatever they can from their experience to defy it. Our good luck is that Shaw bred them all in the nursery of his ample wit, graduating the best of them with first class honours in comprehensive argument. <br />I had a great time renewing my acquaintanceship with this play. How amazing to think that it came so early in his career.<br />There were many things about the performances that deserve praise - as indeed you have made clear, Kevin. In the first moments Simon Burke delights with the way he can convey a thought with a tiny movement of his facial muscles. He is great company, this slightly ill-at-ease but warm-hearted artist. Eamon Farrow wins us straightaway as the rangy frisky colt that and then shows us something quite different when he lines up with the stallions on a wet and muddy track. This was a significant development - I think - for him; he was terrific at Belvoir about a year ago as a verbally challenged young dope-head; here, he cracked a blistering whip on each line or bundle that the text gave him. Martin Jacobs released his inner lizard as he proposed to Vivie , giving the show a sudden, welcome sexual charge. And if Mr Forsythe grew a little repetitive in his shakes and vocal quakes, he is nonetheless valuable in a Shavian company, because he makes every word and action clear.<br />But of course it is the two actresses with whom one is most concerned - that is where one's hopes lie in a production of "MWP".Ms Schebesta has the resources of clarity and passion to bring the role to vivid life, but at times she launches an attack or fires off some defensive weaponry without letting us see the wound that her antagonist has scored upon her. We hear her indignation, but we don't always see it coursing through her. Ms Schebesta is nearly always ready with a perfectly fluent volley, but the succession of shocks in Vivie's world - the need for adaptation to suddenly changed circumstances - suggest the possibility of some greater variation in her tempos.<br />Ms Thomson's gentle first moves in the role give little hint of the daring we were about to see. Her switch in accent is superbly sustained(though it remained unclear whether this was intended to convey the character's loss of control or an unexpected level of a cutting, near ruthless wit.) unsettling personality). And in the final act her passion had towering dimensions; her voice reached new depths and heights, as she issued forth her demand to be cared for.<br /> What this play says about the struggle the mass of women have had to endure to achieve independence and dignity in our society ; the challenges it throws out to notions of love, loyalty, value, respectability and more; these make one wish that heaps of girls, women , boys and men could get to know its riches.Johnnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7200658218238769688.post-10240767045058154162013-03-28T10:37:44.315+11:002013-03-28T10:37:44.315+11:00This is the most comprehensive review I think I...This is the most comprehensive review I think I've ever read - and I completely agree with it. My only disagreement would be over the choice to drop the Oxford accent in favour of the Cockney grind for lengthy periods - as it went on, it just felt unnatural as a choice (though she pulled it off brilliantly). This is our review for the show, hope you find it interesting: <br /><br />http://dinnerandshowblog.wordpress.com/2013/03/27/shaw-assures-success-stcs-production-of-mrs-warrens-profession/Sydney Abbanoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7200658218238769688.post-30346749849935835962013-02-28T23:48:02.535+11:002013-02-28T23:48:02.535+11:00I say jolly good review dear sir - here's chee...I say jolly good review dear sir - here's cheers! James Waitesnoreply@blogger.com