Every tragedy can have a silver lining…
John Nicholson’s approach to Flaubert’s genuinely iconic heroine is akin to Tom Cruise’s to the Mission Impossible franchise, he, or rather his cast, are genuinely hanging off the side of an airplane in front of our very eyes, frequently breaching the fourth wall in ways that carry potential danger both in terms of narrative cohesion but also audience ad-libbing. At one point the action is stopped and Dennis Herdman, aka Ratman 1 and various Emma Bovary lovers, asks for a show of hands of those who have read the book, about half of us raised ours and he quickly pointed at me to ask what my favourite part was, “I love the bit with the hamsters” came my reply, cue side-eyed response as the cast discussed whether we were just pretending to be well-read.
Nothing was going to throw panto-hardened Mr Herdman though and it is indeed a valid question for this play works both as a stand-alone comedy but also as an examination of so many nineteenth century heroines who loved and lived only to face the ultimate penalty. In another section the cast discussed the inevitability or otherwise of Emma’s fate, with the actress playing her, Jennifer Kirby (late of Call the Midwife but also the RSC, and it showed), saying that she wanted her character to have agency which is very much how Flaubert challenged his audience in 1856. I was reminded of Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, in which he added substance to two minor and easily dismissed characters from Hamlet to show what choices any of us have. In its own way, Nicholson’s play is closer to his source material but then there is so much to work with, Emma Bovary is a character written with substance, as well-detailed as any of the descriptive passages in the “realist” novel.
This play is realist only to the extent that its players know they are in a play and, have to make decisions that honour their characters. Other than that, it is a rip-roaring pantomime that looks to blow the narrative off course through the introduction of two rat catchers, or Vermin Termination Officers, played by Dennis Herdman and Sam Alexander. Ratman 1 just happens to buy all of the arsenic in the chemists, a necessary ingredient for their new vermination business, leaving none left for the suicidal wife of the local GP/health officer. In the Ratcatchers’ room at the Golden Lion, Emma unfolds her tale to Ratman 1 and thus the play meets the book… and you wonder how the gap in tonality can be joined.
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| Jennifer Kirby - all photographs from Steve Gregson |
The whole enterprise rests on a fabulous performance from Jennifer Kirby, who is with one brief exception, always playing Emma Bovary throughout and grounding events in a version of the character that exists in both comedic and tragic variations. Her delivery is strong and the classical background pays dividends along with her physicality as a well-cast Madame B. Her steadfast presence allows Herdman and Alexander to play the fool along with the marvellous Alistair Cope… who transitions from a man with a wooden leg to a pharmacist, inn keeper and a cow with ease.
Alexander plays Dr Bovary as an innocent largely unaware of the depth of his wife’s needs, he’s achieved his ambition of being a general practitioner in a small town but cannot fathom why she needs more, exhibiting what Flaubert described as “the natural cowardice that characterizes the stronger sex.” Emma’s needs, founded on her heavy addiction to romantic fiction and her search for the truest emotions described within, lead her not just to the many men played by Herdman, but also to fine fabrics and expensive clothes aided by the unscrupulous Monsieur Lheureux (Mr Cope), happy to extend her ruinous credit.
But it’s in her relationships with earnest local clerk Leon and wealthy gadfly Rodolphe Boulanger who’s scene riding in the woods with Emma as they consummate their attraction is performed through the means of prestidigitation, as flowers are pulled from under dresses, bunting from the Bovary bodice and red balls from hands and mouth… it’s the play’s party piece, and based on a show of hands at the start of act two, they did it all over again as Emma announces she has a lover… a lover.
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| Sam Alexander, Jennifer Kirby and Alistair Cope get medical... |
IThankYou Theatre verdict: The theatre was full and,
as this was not the press night, the audience were there with no other
expectation than to be entertained and the play certainly succeeded on that
front. It’s a tricky path to “find the comedy in tragedy” but I think, in the
end, the play finds the tragedy in comedy too; it’s a celebration of a book we
all should read and in the hands of these four marvellous actors, it is the
perfect pantomime for those who seek integrity in their heroes and villains.
Marieke Audsley directs with authority and clearly has the team on stage playing for each other, as we’d say in soccer and props also to Amy Watts stage design (see what I did there?) for an innovative set that allows the actors to chalk up signs, poems, ducks and record players – a needle drop of Noel Harrison singing Michel Legrand’s Windmills of You Mind (written for the Thomas Crown Affair) being especially welcome.
I’d say: **** Fearlessly funny around and not about the story, with a sympathetic Emma in Jennifer Kirby, humour as well as longings all intact, as she looks to the future now, it’s only just begun.
The play runs until 17th December and you can order via the Jermyn Street Theatre website here.
Flaubert is further examined in the JST’s forthcoming Promise Season with the debut play by historian Orlando Figes. The Oyster Problem tells the story of the French novelist’s catastrophic search for a day job.
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| Sam Alexander and Dennis Herdman: Buckle up, it's going to be a bumpy ride! |
