ABSURD PERSON SINGULAR AT THE ARTS THEATRE
The Second Christmas with a party of disasters ahead
Edgy, amusing and bitterly ironic, Absurd Person Singular illustrates 1972 in a way few contemporary plays can. Alan Ayckbourn might appear a genial comedy writer, reliably turning out top class dramatic pieces from his Scarborough retreat, each one a winner. But Ayckbourn is a bitter sweet writer and along with the jollity runs an undertow of savage commentary on the social life of his day. If the Seventies was the most inventive of recent decades, its most revolutionary subversive time – think of the, the journey into fantasy drugs and social contusion of so much artistic expression, the originality of the era – it was also ripe for satire. Ayckbourn was the man to throw the Absurd into the mix– sometimes gently often with savage cold eyed disdain. It is said he snatched the title randomly from a piece of paper lying about, but it cunningly links this populist author to the intellectual Theatre of the Absurd, with its French roots in Artaud and Genet and its major English exponent Harold Pinter.
Helen Keeley as Eva Jackson on the brink of a nervous breakdown
Three couples spend three consecutive Christmases together. First up as hosts are the ultra nervous Hopcrafts, Sydney and Jane. Paul Sandys and Felicity Houlbrooke are superb as the upwardly mobile dithering duo so very aware that their guests present a challenge and equally determined to get the cocktail party in their new house absolutely right in every detail. The tension is palpable, Sidney is a pernickety martinet (an ex Navy man with an overwhelming sense of order) whilst his wife with her obsessive cleaning is almost frozen with apprehension at having to entertain. The scenes where she slips out of the house to replenish the drinks and finds herself marooned in the garden in the pouring rain, tapping gingerly on the glass, are full on farce. But Ayckbourn weaves a backdrop of bullish male camaraderie and sexist banter between the men; bank manager Graham O’Mara is wonderfully louche with a sense of his assumed social superiority a second nature whilst John Dorney gives a hilarious presentation of a 70s architect, loaded with self importance and sexual predation. Sidney Hopcraft is out of his depth in this world of bawdy badinage, as he sweetly offers a wholesome take on the physique of the woman the other two would-be stags are lasciviously discussing,”is it the hiking? he ventures ‘That gives her the great you-know-what?” He’s disadvantaged in this sophisticated smut, but about to wreak a special kind of revenge as the lives of the couples unravel.
In many ways this is a play about sexual identity. Only by drinking does the brittle Marion Brewster-Wright survive and her confidence gradually shatters as the play progresses. Rosanna Miles gives a brilliant performance with the kind of manic energy that increases the deadly tension in every scene Helen Keeley as the suicidal Eva Jackson (wife of trendy architect Geoffrey) commands the centre stage at the second Christmas where her attempts at self destruction are all ignored or misinterpreted by the ultra practical Hopcrofts and self promotional Brewster WrightsThis is a brilliant performance in a demanding role .Only Jane Hopcroft remains her. practical brisk self , an identity that hardens as the play progresses.
It might be funny in parts, but Absurd Person Singular is a serious critique of the mores and morals of its age. Few playwrights can produce a mordant masterpiece like the ever inventive Ayckbourn. The London Classic Theatre are right to recognize this as a major play and give it the kind of superbly acted and deftly directed treatment it surely deserves.
