Ayckbourn feels like one of those British writers that has perpetually been on local stages, but it’s actually been about 7 years since Canberra last saw one of his plays (with “Improbable Fiction”) – his incisive, cleverly structured plays about middle-class foibles and follies hold up reasonably strongly, even (as in this case) almost 50 years after they were originally written – yes, this is clearly a product of a more distant time (I don’t think a contemporary play would have all three wives apparently not having an out-of-the-house job without that being a significant plot point, for example), but such things as the blatant sexism of the men when left alone, the social panic as people try to put on their best face to one another, and the way people inevitably bend to those with greater professional power are, alas, fairly eternal. It also, to a certain sense, takes the form of a backstage comedy, as three pairs of party-givers peddle madly to keep a convivial face as disasters big and small threaten to swamp their festive gatherings.
We begin with the upwardly mobile Hopcrofts, both obsessed with appearances and making inroads with their party guests to the point of active cruelty towards the cleaning-obsessed Jane (and it’s a massive pleasure to get a classic Amy Dunham nutbag performance paired with a tightly-wound Arran McKenna performance) – and get introduced to two couples, the Brewster-Wrights (mildly oblivious banker and his tipsy wife), and the Jacksons (lothario architect and his depressed pill-popping wife), with another couple, the boisterous Potters left offstage to threaten everyone into retreat with their boorish behaviour.
Act two moves on to the apartment occupied by the Jacksons (and their hound-of-the-Baskervilles-like dog, another engrossing not-actually-on-stage character who’s brought to life through Neville Pye’s sound effects and some persistent door wiggling by the crew and cast), as Eva (a heartbreaking Steph Roberts) prepares a suicide note while her husband prepares to fly the coop with his new love, first seeking out a doctor to take care of her – both not realising they have invited the other couples over for pre-Christmas drinks. This act runs a tightrope – clearly there’s nothing humorous about attempted suicide, but there’s humour in the obliviousness of everyone around to her plight, assuming the various suicide attempts are home repairs projects and helping to carry those out (Dunham’s manic cleaning fetish of the first act gets a strong workout here), and this production manages to credit both the emotions and the absurdity of the moment.
Act three takes us to the posh Brewster-Wrights as the couple have retreated to their corners – Ronald reading in the kitchen, his wife in her bedroom cheerfully sodden. We get updates on what’s happened to the Jacksons, still together despite everything, and the intrusion of the Hopcrofts who have ridden the wave of success to the point where they have power over those they used to suck up to.
Jarrad West’s production is set very roughly a decade after the writing of the play, about the last time that the premise of three marriages where the husband is the sole breadwinner would hold true, in the mid 80s, late enough to feature Wham’s “Last Christmas” and a kitchen with a microwave – but it’s not fetishizing the period so much as choosing a time when the action fits. Costumes and set are nicely varied to delineate the three couples – from the chintzy practicality of the Hopcrofts to the squalor of the Jacksons to the grand-but-slightly-sterile look of the Brewster-Wrights.
This is a packed-plum-pudding of a Christmas play, full of laughs but also full of emotional truth, and a perfectly matched cast brings it across effectively with charm and insight.
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