Birdland and the empty promise of celebrity - or - An open love letter to Andrew Scott from a secre

By JBR

“I'm sick of the word celebrity. It's so overused now isn’t it? You just hear it everywhere! Celebrity this, celebrity that - celebrity toilet flushing! You know? It's like… what even is it any more?”

Fame! Filthy lucre! Andrew Scott! Go see Birdland.

I’ve been staring at a white screen for days now and wondering what to say about Birdland, and that sums it up. Birdland stars Andrew Scott and for most people that’s enough. Scott is a rock star. I mean, yes, he's playing a rock star in this; Paul, a beautiful, blighted rock star but actually I mean Scott is a rock star. A genuine theatrical rock star. With proper hard-core-do-anything-for-him fans. Or is that Paul? Wait...

Everyone understands Radcliffe-mania, we get that, it’s as much about his cultural identity as an icon for a generation as it is about his youth and looks and talent. We, literally, grew up with him. With Scott though, it’s more subtle. Here’s a man, an admittedly quite private man, who has exploded onto the public consciousness, quite suddenly, in his mid-thirties and who overnight became a household name. But more than that, he has become iconic. Moriarty mania is still very much in evidence, even in more usually staid and rarefied theatrical circles.

The stalls audience at the Royal Court are mostly in their late teens and early twenties. They are appreciative and quiet, and yet there is a tangible excitement that fizzes through the house. Everyone seems to be talking about Scott. My neighbour, an attractive intelligent young woman in her early twenties came because of him. A deliciously bonkers lady who wants to know my name in case we are bombed and die together (!) came because of Andrew Scott. A large party of around thirty teenagers monopolised the stalls; mixed genders. They came because of Andrew Scott. The crowd who hang around before and after the performance are mostly there because of Andrew Scott. This is his time. So if you only need one reason to see Birdland, then see it because Andrew Scott on stage is an experience in itself.

The cult of Scott aside, it occurs to me that you might, possibly, need more than one reason. I mean, it might sell out soon and then the only way you’re going to get a ticket will be to queue for day seats. Getting up early, going and standing out there in all weathers - well, you know, that takes commitment. You might want more reasons than “It’s got Andrew Scott”.

You might, for example, be swayed by the name Simon Stephens. Not only is Stephens one of our great playwrights, but the combination of Stephens and Scott has pedigree. It is the collaboration of these two which produced Seawall; proving that two titanic talents working in sync, knowing each other so well, can produce something breathtaking. That’s certainly evident here, in perhaps more ways than one. Was I the only person who couldn’t shake the feeling that so much of Paul, Scott’s impish, damaged anti-hero in Birdland, could have been Scott speaking? “I walk into a room. Far more people know who I am than I could possibly know” he muses; later “Who are these people? What do they want from me all the fucking time?” Scott teases us with this duality; from the moment the lights come up on the sinewy, peacocking Scott, he breaks the fourth wall throughout, reaching out and acknowledging, with a cheeky glance, the audience sat in the dark observing his spectacular downfall like ancient Romans pressed into an amphitheatre. “Can’t you see them?” he barks, glaring out into the stalls. J’accuse. Reader, I trembled.

This is fame as blood sport. We, the audience, are the baying crowds. The crowds that only Paul can see. That quote about celebrity I kicked off with comes from my 2013 interview with Scott, but couldn’t it have come straight from the mouth of Stephens' morally bankrupt Paul? It’s curious then that in this deliciously fertile theatrical marriage, Stephens would chose to say, well, nothing really. Fame isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Money doesn’t buy happiness. This is predictable territory. It’s all a little like one of those inspirational texts you see on Facebook. It reveals nothing new; it’s so much familiar, well-trod ground.

So what? See it anyway. See it because, while Scott’s coruscating performance is virtuosic, this is an ensemble where each is as electrifying as the next. Precise and focussed, the clarity of performances are insightful - it is slick and taut, hurtling through almost two hours without a flabby moment. Stephens might not be saying anything new, but by God, this cast are saying it brilliantly.

See it because of Carrie Cracknell’s direction. It’s fluid and light; the scenes glimmer like a Seurat - packed with tiny flecks of detail. There’s an acute intelligence at work here, an understanding, not just of how to work with actors, but of how to work with space. This is Cracknell demonstrating, once again, her maturity as an artist.

Mainly, though, see it for Andrew Scott. For his sexy, wild, iridescent performance. For his delectable way of speaking every syllable as if it has only just sprung into his mind. See it for his sprightly, inventive, dazzling acting. See it because in this, this play, this moment of time, Andrew Scott is a rock star. And he probably hates it.

@JoshRochford

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