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Show: La Ronde
Society: London (professional shows)
Venue: The Bunker, 53A Southwark Street, London SE1 1RU
Credits: By Arthur Schnitzler, newly adapted by Max Gill. A Collaborative Artists production in association with Heretic Production
Type: Sardines
Author: Chris Abbott
Performance Date: 13/02/2017
La Ronde
Chris Abbott | 14 Feb 2017 11:22am
Alex Vlahos, Amanda Wilkin, Lauren Samuels and Leemore Marrett Jr. Photo: Ray Burmiston
In the recent RSC production of Faustus, the two lead actors walked on stage and each lit a match; the extinguishing of the first flame deciding the casting of each actor for that performance. Similarly, the recent production of Schiller’s Mary Stuart at the Almeida began with the toss of a coin deciding the casting of the two queens. Casting by chance and in the presence of the audience, then, is very much part of the theatrical zeitgeist, and when gender-neutral casting (and writing) is added to the mix, the result, in the new adaptation of La Ronde at The Bunker, is a fascinating event with multiple possibilities.
In this production, the casting decisions continue to be by chance throughout the performance. La Ronde has been seen in many different guises and lends itself to directorial invention, but this is a very free adaptation owing only the basic structure and some of the characters to Schnitzler (who gets only one brief mention in the programme). The play consists of a series of meetings leading to sex between people who link the various sections, one of each couple appearing in the next scene opposite a new character, until the circle is complete and we meet again the character who began the evening.
This adaptation is by Max Gill, who also directs this production for Collaborative Artists. The location has been moved from Vienna in 1897 to London in the present day, and Gill’s often funny dialogue helps to provide the instant creation of characters which is necessary in a piece where we know only what we see and hear. Small hints are given to enable us to see growing links between the characters as the evening progresses, with deft strategies included to ensure that each part can be played by any of the four actors, two men and two women.
Playing in the Bunker’s comfortable and welcoming underground space, the stage is dominated by a bed in front of a large wheel which will be used to select the cast member for each role. There is an excellent and informative programme: so often not the case in off-West End venues. Key props are cleverly used to illuminate settings and sometimes transfer into the next scene along with the overlapping characters.
Excellent support is provided by the lighting, especially when creating locations such as the lift in which two characters are stranded or the passage of time between scenes. Nathan Klein’s sound and composition add immeasurably to the piece, creating atmosphere even before it begins and including verbatim transcripts from south Londoners talking about their sex lives. This is an intriguing idea, but since the transcripts tend to be played as the wheel is turning, the audience finds itself much more drawn to the next casting decision rather than listening to the voices.
All four actors are impressive, creating character in seconds and having committed all the roles to memory: there are, as the programme reminds us, over three thousand different combinations of actors that are possible in this production. On Press Night the fickle hand of fate seemed to be investing the wheel of chance with a perverse reluctance to select one of the four actors, and the performance was very nearly hijacked by the audience becoming ever more involved in where the pointer would stop, almost turning a thought-provoking play into a game show.
For the final scene, the wheel was not spun – presumably to ensure that the fourth actor at least got to play one part. The actor concerned, Leemore Marrett Jr, provided a good account of a jaded actor with a secret, and must have been relieved that after sitting on a chair for most of the evening, and despite getting changed into a new costume for each spin of the wheel, he was finally able to play at least one role.
The other three actors were handed more opportunities. Alexander Vlahos played a prostitute, a cancer patient, a PhD student and a university professor with versatility and was quietly convincing. Amanda Wilkin included among her parts a bus driver, the doctor’s partner and an online date. In many ways, she was handed the most difficult range of parts by the wheel but she managed to create believable and engrossing cameos.
The fourth actor, Lauren Samuels, was handed some very varied roles, including an Eastern European cleaner, an American media personality, a young mother and a hospital consultant. This set of roles enabled her to use accent as well as props and costume to create character, leading her roles to be more memorable than some of the others; but presumably the same would have been true of the other actors if they had been allotted the same roles. Many in the audience must have been tempted to return to see another version of the production with very different casting.
This is a clever and enthralling adaptation of an important play. Lasting rather longer than the stated running time at just over two hours without an interval, there were times when the pace seemed to slacken, especially in some of the early scenes. The decision to run without an interval, however, was clearly correct in order to build and maintain the casting tension and for the audience to stay with the multiple character outlines. The wheel, however, had a mind of its own and was definitely spun for too long, so perhaps some mechanical attention could lead to this being a shorter and crisper part of the process. And maybe, if only to be fair to all four of these impressive actors, the process should be tweaked so that no actor is missed out completely, even if that is due to chance.
- : admin
- : 13/02/2017