Back on the stage twenty years after it first opened at the National Theatre (where it won the Laurence Olivier Award for best new play in 2004 and later a Tony Award nomination for best play in 2005), The Pillowman is an early but typical Martin McDonagh drama. Packed full of fast dialogue, monologues, foul language and, mainly, hidden violence. I was able to download the full script which comes in at sixty nine pages. The setting is the office of a top detective for a totalitarian state. Enter Steve Pemberton (Inside No 9) as Tupolski and Paul Kaye (primarily known in our house as the pathologist in Vera) as his henchman Ariel. Already there is a blindfolded Katurian, played against gender by Lilly Allen. Interrogation ensues.
Of course there have been murders. Katurian cannot understand why she is involved, only later to find out why. There is a long, long scene when she (he) is in a cell with her brother Michal (Matthew Tennyson) where why they got there is bandied back and forth. This is where the gender swop comes into it's own. I was at times wondering just what it would have been like with Katurian as a man, and I just could not believe it would have been better. I thought about Alex Kingston as Prospero that seemed to be perfect casting.
Director Matthew Dunster knows what it's like to direct a McDonagh play after the success of the brilliant Hangmen. The Pillowman was written after the playwright's six Irish plays and is a kind a catalyst for those dramas to come, of which Hangmen is typical. Of course, the actors are great, who would not be with such material at their disposal. Lily Allen's performance has had mixed reviews, I thought she did well, a mixture of vulnerability and strength.
Alison came with me into London and we had a pleasant lunch at Giraffe on the Southbank. Outside but under cover was perfect.
No comments:
Post a Comment