Tag Archives: Diana Quick

“Midnight Your Time” from the Donmar Warehouse

Ensuring we don’t forget one of the West End’s smallest – and enormously prestigious – venues during dangerous times for all theatres, director Michael Longhurst presents a specially commissioned film. Written by Adam Brace, and originally penned for High Tide, it’s very good indeed. And, of course, deserving of donations.

There are many monologues about at the moment and the idea of one based on Skype calls, when a lot of work has gone online, might be the last thing most of us want. But it’s a clever idea, appropriate to the times, and the one-way messages between Judy and her daughter Helen prove engrossing, moving and entertaining.

Set in 2010, as if to remind us that isolation of one kind or another is nothing new, Brace has created an easily recognisable lead that Diana Quick performs with ease. There’s a gentle humour around this upper-middle-class well-meaning Islingtonite that makes the character a touch too naïve. But it’s fun to watch as she is “gazumped” over dinner with an Afghan refugee and makes gaffs, despite her good intentions.

Produced under lockdown conditions, which only increases my admiration, Longhurst and Quick are clearly a great team. The scenes have a nice variety, not just of costumes and times of day, but also of distinct atmospheres. Quick shows her character’s moods marvellously, from being “lighter than air” to angry and upset. There are also nice touches over her hesitancy with the technology – especially when she deletes messages that have gone too far.

Judy’s relationship with her daughter is a fraught one, and Brace and Quick unveil this with great skill. How serious an argument over Christmas was becomes clear slowly and is increasing moving. Although we never get her daughter’s side of the story, Judy’s interference in the young woman’s life would surely be a problem. But, combined with Judy’s loneliness and worries for the future, this is a neat study that raises surprising sympathy and is a great half-hour watch.

Available until the 20 May 2020

www.donmarwarehouse.com

“Electra” at the Old Vic

Frank McGuinness’ version of Electra is currently playing at the Old Vic. Directed by Ian Rickson, with satisfying confidence, this no-nonsense version of Sophocles’ tragedy, about a daughter’s revenge on her mariticidal mother, is direct and powerful.

This is a fine production with Kristin Scott Thomas in the title role. She’s the star attraction, but it should be stressed that the whole cast is strong. Diana Quick is suitably regal as the detested mother Clytemnestra and Jack Lowden gives a moving depth to Electra’s prodigal brother Orestes.

Hauteur has been a career specialty for Scott Thomas and, since Electra is a princess, it’s used to advantage here. But this is a remarkably earthy performance, free from vanity and physically charged. She is dynamic, pacing around as if caged. Even when on the ground, little of her body touches the earth. Convulsed with grief, every muscle is expressive. And animalistic: her centre of gravity is low and every sense heightened to suggest a hunted figure. This intimation of the feral doesn’t disappear with a cry of joy as Orestes reappears – Electra sniffs her brother as if to confirm that he is one of her brood.

As well as its easy appeal, McGuinness’ text gets to the heart of the tale with efficiency. Along with the horror of the story, dilemmas are presented cogently with an emphasis on religion that Rickson develops.
Quick and Lowden both represent the questions surrounding their bloody family legacy well. The urgency of Electra’s need for justice, which creates a manic “fire in her head”, is balanced with cogent arguments, delineated by Scott Thomas with eviscerating intelligence.

Until 20 December 2015

www.oldvictheatre.com

Photo by Johan Persson

Written 8 October 2014 for The London Magazine

“The American Plan” at the St James Theatre

Arriving from the Ustinov Studio (Theatre Royal Bath), having already received a big thumbs-up from the critics, The American Plan opened in London last night at the St. James Theatre. Full of laughs and bittersweet wisdom, this exquisitely written play from 1990 by Richard Greenberg deals with not one but several love stories.

Here we have a fascinating trio of women. Eva and her “difficult” daughter Lili, wealthy refugees from the Nazis, are on vacation with their maid Olivia in the Catskill Mountains across a lake from other Jewish families who flock to the area. The women are isolated by an amusing, imported snobbery. Until a young man arrives.

Nick is a “blue chip stock” kind of guy, but true romance isn’t the story here. All these Americans, émigrés old and new, are full of plans and a warped determination to bring them to fruition. Plots might be a more accurate description if there wasn’t so much sincerity behind their motivation. The lies they tell are often deliciously funny but there’s real heart here, too.

Entangled with a family, not eccentric but “giddy around the circumference”, where the daughter is the wrong side of neurotic and the matriarch lives up to every stereotype of Jewish motherhood, you never much rate Nick’s chances. But he has secrets and pain of his own and watching them revealed is great theatre.

And the lies don’t stop with the introduction of the final character, Gil. In the part, Mark Edel-Hunt more than makes up for his later arrival with a great plot twist that, since I liked the play so much, I really don’t want to spoil.

Diana Quick is scene stealing as Eva (her accent alone fascinates), putting the metal in mittel European, and Dona Croll makes a marvellous foil for her as the “enduring” Olivia whose inscrutable privacy hints at yet more tales. Emily Taaffe fully embodies the “mercurial” Lili, delighting with her wit then shocking with a traumatic intensity. And effectively subduing his character’s hidden depths until just the right moment, Luke Allen-Gale is tremendous as Nick.

This production does true justice to a fine play and it’s clear those responsible have a thorough understanding of the text. More than his intelligent exploration of “intricately unhappy” lives, Greenberg brings a Jamesian flavour and intelligent humour to his examination of our deepest self-fashioning. The result is a play that resonates with depth.

Until 10 August 2013

www.stjamestheatre.co.uk

Photo by Jane Hobson

Written 9 July 2013 for The London Magazine