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Written
and directed by
David Farr
Designer
Ti Green
Lighting
Designer
Mark Henderson
Music
Keith Clouston
Sound
Designer
John Leonard
President
Anton
Antonovich
Skvosnik
Kenneth Cranham
Minister
for
Justice,
Ammos Lyapkin
David Ryall
Minister
for
Health,
Georgy
Zemlyanjka
Michael Gould
Minister
for
Education,
Luka Klopov
Sam Cox
Minister
for
Finance,
Stepana Ivanovna
Elizabeth
Bell
Head
of
Intelligence,
Ivan Kuzmich
Sphyokin
Geoffrey
Beevers
Peter
Robchinski
Justin Salinger
Peter
Dobchinski
Jonathan
McGuinness
Svistunov
Mark Leadbetter
Anna
Andreyevna
Geraldine
James
Maria
Antonovna
Daisy Haggard
Sammy
Nicholas
Tennant
Martin
Gammon
Michael Sheen
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National
Theatre
7
June - 5 October 2005 |
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What
is it that we ask of comedy?
Do we ask merely to be entertained,
or do we hope that in seeing
the follies and weaknesses
of mankind ridiculed before
us, we might avoid or prevent
them? If the latter, then
comedy can be a serious business.
Applying the themes of corruption
and bribery in Gogol's
The
Government Inspector
to the
corruption at the heart of
the recent Ukrainian election,
David Farr's new play
The
UN Inspector
asks its audience to reflect
on individual cases of human
rights abuse.
Gogol's comedy relies on stock-characters
that all can recognise - but
layers them with a complex
individuality and humanity,
so that it is impossible not
to see elements of oneself
in each. Farr's decision to
allow the actors to play their
characters for all-out laughs
potentially cancels the fine
nuances so carefully wrought
by Gogol in the original,
thereby destroying their human
pathos. Many cheap gags are
made around the case of a
young woman journalist kidnapped
for knowing too much, whose
tongue is cut out to maintain
her silence. In such ways,
the dramatic action of Farr's
adaptation risks never striking
so deeply as it might have.
But Farr's strategy allows
the actors greater freedom
to develop complexity themselves.
Those who positively inhabit
their characters, such as
Jonathan McGuinness as Dobchinski,
Michael Gould as Minister
for Health, and Geoffrey Beevers
as Head of Intelligence, are
genuinely funny without compromising
their humanity. We can laugh
at them and know it is ourselves
we laugh at, because we recognise
an element of our own nature
in sympathy with them. Those,
however, who aim to prove
the innate comedy in their
characters - as Sam Fox does
with his character Luka -
are those we laugh at and
enjoy, but feel nothing for.
Unfortunately, this is the
case with the main character,
the President (Kenneth Cranham).
In his opening scene, the
pantomimic inflections he
gives to his gestures - his
little runs and leaps - never
ring true and are exaggerated
by the large space around
him, which demands to be filled.
His movements seem directed
by the space, rather than
emerging from his character
and dominating it. (For this
reason, the scene in which
Martin Gammon is received
at the Presidential palace
works well simply because
Cranham's undirected energy
suddenly finds a focus and
reacts with that of Michael
Sheen. It is a scene that
deserves to go down as one
of the greats of British comedy.)
It is not clear that failure
of dramatic intention always
lies with the actors. In some
cases, Farr seems to write
out their humanity. Maria,
the President's daughter,
is a good example. In Gogol's
text Marya is at once intelligent
and naÔve; whereas Farr's
Maria is reduced to a cynical
posturing teenager who drapes
herself suggestively over
the furniture. Given that
Farr changes the ending of
Gogol's play to one in which
she is killed as a result
of her father's corruption,
it would seem imperative that
Maria be portrayed with enough
humanity that an audience
can feel something at the
moment of her death. Yet she
is so one-dimensional there
is nothing for an audience
to grasp. When the moment
comes it has no impact. When
reality intrudes and the consequences
of political corruption are
brought to the fore, there
is a momentary engagement
with the moral centre of the
play, lasting as long as the
staged moment. This production
is keen to hasten those moments
in order to get back to the
comedy, the light relief.
The final tableau lasts as
long as comic timing dictates,
and prepares the way for comfortable
cheering and applause, whereas
Gogol stipulated that the
final tableau must last a
minute and a half, long enough
to unsettle an audience waiting
for the house lights to go
up.
A fervent admirer of the play
might, in reply, say that
it never tries to be Gogol's
play; it is what it is and
decides from the outset that
its priority is to be topical
comedy. In this respect it
works very well. It is highly
funny and enjoyable, with
a moral core that is at least
detectable. It allows theatre-goers
to emerge in buoyant mood
without being morally or financially
bankrupt. It is topical, not
meant to be of lasting importance.
It is pure theatre, and would
work in no other medium. In
that respect, The
UN Inspector
is an indication that drama
is alive and well in this
country. We can rest assured
that the National is doing
its job.
Is this production a serious
comedy? It leaves us in danger
of being as little in touch
with what constitutes artistic
integrity as the Supreme Censor,
Nicholas I, who passed Gogol's
play for performance because
he understood it to be purely
slapstick entertainment.
Laura
Keynes |
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