Tag Archives: Richard Greenberg

“Breakfast at Tiffany’s” at the Theatre Royal Haymarket

Richard Greenberg’s adaptation of Truman Capote’s novella wins admiration for resolutely not replicating the famous film onstage. Going back to the original source, there’s a determination to show the dark side of heroine Holly Golightly’s desperate life: prostitution, abuse and depression, described as the “mean reds”. It’s a disorientating experience for an audience if expectations are based on the production poster. Not necessarily a bad thing.

Sitting near me, a fan of singer Pixie Lott, who takes top billing in a font size bigger than the title, seemed puzzled. It can’t have been the thin story, which director Nikolai Foster propels nicely. Maybe it’s the small amount of singing (although what there is impresses). Lott gives a credible performance, tethered by studiously avoiding any trace of the movie’s iconic star, Audrey Hepburn. Here, Holly is blonde, defiant and downright sexy – it really is “Golightly gone” – a total transformation. A fine idea, but consequently we have to wait until two emotional scenes near the end to really glimpse Lott’s considerable acting potential.

Matt
Matt Barber

It’s clear to Lott, although it may be another surprise to some, that Holly isn’t the focus here. It’s Capote’s alter ego, a nameless writer, we are forced to focus on. Played by an exceptionally hard working Matt Barber, who injects a good deal of dynamism, fiercely holding the show together, it all comes down to how interesting you find this one writer’s struggle for success and journey of sexual discovery.

Capote, of course, found himself fascinating. If you don’t share his opinion, despite Foster’s efforts, the story is inconsequential. The show comes close to feeling like breakfast, lunch and dinner at Tiffany’s when just a cup of coffee would have sufficed. And there’s a cat – an astonishingly well-trained one you can follow on Twitter (@TiffanysBobCat). While everyone here is far too good to be upstaged by his feline talents, I’d rather follow him than the author any day.

Greenberg’s work is exemplary in creating the feel of a short story on stage – which is interesting – so the crux is how much Capote you can cope with? The case against? Holly isn’t quite the invention she’s cracked up to be, while secondary characters are weak, with the ensemble reduced to dodgy divertissements (rollerskates? No thank you). If you like your humour waspish with a big dose of self-indulgence, this fine production serves the author better than he deserves.

www.breakfastattiffanys.co.uk

Until 17 September 2016

Photos by Sean Ebsworth Barnes

“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