|
|
 |
| |
An Eligible Man review |
New End Theatre |
Rosemary Friedman's third screenplay
AN ELIGIBLE MAN
New End Theatre
LOVERS of soufflé-light comedy will find much to admire in novelist and screenwriter Rosemary Friedman’s third dramatic offering.
It features an urbane and newly widowed judge, a bourgeois bohemian daughter, a blokey male confidante and three would-be wives. Strangely, all of these individuals have unfettered access to the grieving man’s lounge. So far, so sitcom.
Nothing wrong with that. But the laboured references to Pushkin, Montaigne and some pseudo-poetic dialogue suggest a desire for greater significance.
This is a shame because, if it dropped its high art pretensions, An Eligible Man would make a fine TV series.
Ninon Jerome’s pacy direction and Alex Marker’s exquisitely detailed set both add to this impression.
Graham Seed’s beguiling judge Christopher (Topher) Osgood is apparently lost without his dead wife.
And to prove it, he bumbles around his now chaotic home, pausing occasionally to speak to her ashes.
Fortunately, his best pal, Malcolm James’s likeable Marcus, is on hand to chivvie him along with good sense and some well-delivered jokes.
But Topher’s daughter – a miscast but game Patricia Potter – is not amused when three very different women find themselves competing for the good judge’s affections.
Despite the play’s contrived feel and some clunky scene changes, there are some priceless moments to enjoy.
Maggie Hallinan’s ageing vamp, Lucille, is a joy as she drunkenly sings along to an Andrew Lloyd Webber tune; and Grainne Gillis’s smug novelist, Sally, dispenses self- help platitudes to hilarious effect.
Indeed, the ensemble acting is so strong that you hardly mind Topher’s clumsily grafted-on visit to China, or the brutally obvious denouement.
However, more development of the poignant parent/child relationship would lend this work the emotional depth it strives for.
Until June 8
0870 033 2733 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
