philipchevron wrote:The Entertainer
by John Osborne (Old Vic, London)
But half a century later, it is not "Look Back In Anger" which has the greater claim to "classic" status, but the much more incisive, disciplined and visceral "The Entertainer". What the earlier play dramatised was the collapse of the British class system, and it's easy to see why that was such a potent thing to do in post-war, pre-Beatles Britain, But "The Entertainer" deconstructs and dismantles something much more fundamental - it is an elegy to the whole notion of Britishness, a farewell to Empire. And one can't help thinking that, if anyone realised that in 1957, when the Suez crisis had decisively exposed the Emperor's nakedness on the world stage, few dared express it in such stark terms. In the light of the iconic ironing board in "Look Back In Anger" the metaphor of the dying Music Hall tradition in the play was welcomed as another staging post in Osborne's narrative of genteel British decline.
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In 2007, we come to "The Entertainer" forewarned and forearmed. Not only is the Empire dead, but its consequences follow us around still and, from all appearances, our leaders have learned next to nothing from its defeat. "Look Back In Anger" is a very good, shouty play but, even with Michael Sheen leading an NT revival a few years ago, it is no longer much more than that. "The Entertainer",on the other hand, must now be counted among the truly great plays of the 20th century, and Lindsay, his company and director Sean Holmes do it the honour of giving it its full value.
I thought it was an exceptional production. Many of Osborne's plays haven't aged awfully well, but the present political climate made The Entertainer seem as fresh as it was 50-odd years ago.
I've taught some modern drama on an Eng Lit MA and students tend to be a tad bemused by Look Back in Anger, which seems really rather tame and yes, shouty, now.
Choosing which recent plays to teach on the course was an interesting exercise. I went for Sarah Kane's Blasted and found myself rather surprised when students seemed almost blase about it. Some of them were more shocked by the men bonking in public toilets in Alan Hollinghurst's The Swimming Pool Library when we studied that text the previous week! All I can think of is that the horrors of Blasted don't seem real when read on the printed page. Either that, or students are inured to such violence by what they see on TV every day.
-- but this is one of their very strongest songs. It takes JP into the 1980s and 1990s where he sees creeping Americanisation all around him.
