WHAT'S IN A NAME? AT THE ARTS THEATRE
Laura Patch, Bo Poraj, Alex Gaumond, Summer Strallen and Joe Thomas gather for a night to remember
On a beach in Mauritius director Bernard Murat was reading the script for ‘What’s in a Name?’ (In French Le Prénom) when someone snatched it out of his hand and ran off with it. The culprit was actor Patrick Bruel also on holiday from Paris. He dashed away to read it and then announced to the famous impresario ‘ I must play this part.’ It was the beginning of a long run of success and turned the play - now with six Molière awards - into a top Parisian export. Its story – has caught fire all over the theatre world. Last night it wowed the home audience with a very English interpretation.
It is hugely funny.
Translator Jeremy Sams, clearly a man of genius, first wanted to stage it with American actors in Paris. Then in Brooklyn but finally he brought it home, almost literally , to Peckham where Sams himself lives. Designer Francis O’Connor reflects “We decided to set it here to make it more immediate. Peckham is on the up but also where it’s been for donkey’s years. There are hipsters there but also families”. Sams’ translation was not simply a question of language. It took more than a switcheroo of place names or universities (for instance, the Sorbonne becomes uber-woke Goldsmiths). He wanted “the same effect for English audiences as for the French” so changed everything, from swearing (“there’s a lot more of it in English” and class (always a super-tricky subject but vital for an English comedy). “A play is a symptom, Sams says, and to do a translation you have to cut back to the cause”.
If you imagined the comedy of manners was over think again. A drawing room farce crackling with comedic wit might seem to belong to Sheridan or Wilde or even Stoppard – but young authors Matthieu Delaporte and Alexandre de la Patellière with their translator have created a deep often dark comedy for their own times.
The plot appears simple.
A close-knit group of chic sophisticated friends gathers for an evening of Moroccan food in their affluent sleek flat. There is Peter - savagely realized by Bo Poran from Miranda - the university lecturer with a bookcase full of world classics (exasperated when guests can’t key in the date of Trafalgar when they arrive – it’s 1805 btw) his gorgeous but manically hard-pressed hostess wife Elizabeth (a transcendent role from Laura Patch) - and their supper guests.
Charismatic Joe Thomas (off Inbetweeners) sets the scene for us – then re-appears as Elizabeth’s brilliant bumptious brother Vincent alongside the old family friend Carl – a key role played with subtlety - and an almost imperceptible Swiss accent- by Alex Gaumond. All is fun as they await the arrival of Anna, Vincent’s partner She is expecting a baby. (an expert role from beautiful Summer Strallen). As they sigh over the baby scan, Vincent announces his choice of name and the play kicks into a top gear of comedy, snide insults, more and more revelations, family tension and some truly hilarious but oh-so–biting truths.
This is a play not to miss. Every line is loaded with fun- and meaning. The cast plays the audience like a baited fish- there are shocked silences and eruptions of outraged laughter. This is a drama that sums up modern life with its secrets (some shocking corkers emerge) its pretensions and hidden furies. It’s up there with Art and The Father, both imports from the canny company of Adam Blanshay and Edward Johnson who have found a winning niche importing brilliant French comedies -and feeding them through the talented translators’ mill and out the other side as box office dynamite.
What’s in a Name simply nails it for modern times.
Joe Thomas as our Master of Mischief in last night’s show
