Art for art's sake in The Beautiful Game
- emilylouisehardy
- Apr 9, 2014
- 3 min read
By JBR
There’s a certain catchphrase that bloggers like to add to their reviews at the moment that really gets on my wick. “It’s so good it should transfer to the West End.” I’m always tempted to start drinking ink. It is, I’m sure, supposed to be encouraging and upbeat, and imply a sort of scholarly understanding of what the West End is looking for and how it works. Actually it’s a hoary old cliche that merely betrays the writer’s ignorance of how a commercial body like the West End works, and a naïve belief in the benchmark ‘gold standard’ that the West End is supposed to be. (Fatal Attraction anyone?)
You won’t get that here. Lotte Wakeham’s traverse staging of The Beautiful Game at the Union Theatre is not “so good it should transfer to the West End”. It’s better. Wakeham proves that a director with intelligence, craft and sensitivity is capable of producing a show that is detailed, rich and more vibrant than much of the West End’s output, with nary a tuppence ha’penny to spend.
I wonder how many West End performers would put in a full day's work every day, before heading off to the theatre at night to give a full-out show? That is surely how this talented, hungry company are supporting themselves, given that they are working their guts out for little more than the chance to perform.
That is the bald truth about the Fringe. A West End performer has it comparatively easy which is why it’s so disappointing to see a ‘big’ show with all the money in the world and barely a fraction of the heart of this.
This version of The Beautiful Game, stripped down and unadorned, is yet bold and vibrant. It brims with energy; surprises and delights with inventiveness. Ben Elton’s risible lyrics (swallow a rhyming dictionary, Ben?) grate less with un-amplified voices. The barely dimensional book seems to acquire an agency that it has not earned thanks to the intimacy of the venue. The pedestrian, larghetto score soothes rather than tranquillises and everything just...works. Even Lloyd Webber’s ridiculously gauche ‘pop/rock’ numbers - rap? REALLY? Even they seem fizzy with youthful exuberance as opposed to the toe-curling embarrassments they are.
It isn’t perfect. But I’ve heard worse Irish accents on Broadway. One might even go so far as to say Wakeham has polished the proverbial. Will Burton has cast this superbly, it’s a beautifully tight ensemble firing on all cylinders. Niamh Perry, as Mary, is outstanding in every respect, and she is more than ably supported by Ben Kerr as John. Of the ensemble, Joanna O'Hare particularly shines. Tim Jackson has choreographed with personality; humorous when needed and thrillingly focussed when required. The Final is one of the simplest yet most exciting pieces of dance theatre I’ve seen in a while. It’s his best work to date; the continued partnership between Wakeham and Jackson obviously spurs them both on.
Overall, the whole thing lacks pace, particularly in the first Act, but you’ll forgive that flaw when Stephen Barry's Del languidly pulls a T-Shirt over his bare chest. It lacks tension but that’s Ben Elton’s fault. It lacked a climactic gunshot on press night but that’s the risk you take when your budget is barely there. You can’t cut budgets and get the same quality, George Osborne. The closing lines come across as hectoring rather than touching and it’s missing any real sense of danger, but in this delicate, chamber version, everything pulses with hope, and surely that’s the real message.
But how on earth can it hope to make money? With barely sixty seats (and many of them already in use by the cast) how can this show possibly hope to break-even, set-less and prop-less though it is? It’s not for us to ask how a cast of fifteen are supporting themselves for a month, or why this has become the accepted status quo for the Fringe. Perhaps the Fringe really is the purest example of art for art’s sake. If it were all like The Beautiful Game then we might be grateful. Poor, but grateful.
LISTINGS INFORMATION
Until - May 03 2014 Tuesday – Saturday at 7.30pm - £20 (£18 concessions)
Saturday & Sunday matinees at 2.30pm
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