The Times London 2005
AFTER the Bristol Old Vic’s all-male staging of Oscar Wilde’s enduring comedy comes a production that amends the play’s subtitle to read: “A Trivial Comedy performed by Two Serious People”. They are David Woods and Jon Haynes who, as the duo Ridiculusmus, have been developing their anarchic flights of fancy for the past 13 years.
Previous shows include Say Nothing, about the Northern Ireland peace process, performed in a suitcase full of turf, and Yes, Yes, Yes, a slapstick journey to find the meaning of life. Their artistic credo comes from Samuel Beckett’s last words on theatre: “To find a form that accommodates the mess, that is the task of the artist now.”
This latest show is the first time that they have used a pre-existing text and an external director in Jude Kelly. We seem to be seeing two eccentric amateurs playing all the parts in their own period-costume staging of The Importance of Being Earnest. The set is a warped view of Victoriana with old wallpaper pasted over chairs, sideboards, bookshelves, wardrobes and even a fridge, from which are produced cucumber sandwiches. Muffins pop out of a toaster. Music comes from a visible CD player (Ride of the Valkyries heralds Lady Bracknell, who sports a chicken on her hat) and Haynes and Woods change costumes for each character, even if that means halting the dialogue so they can reply to themselves.
This DIY staging and multiple role-playing highlights the play’s complex pattern of assumed identities as Jack and Algernon both pose as Jack’s non-existent brother Ernest to woo their respective beloveds, Gwendolen and Cecily. It also emphasises that the hierarchy and niceties of society are pure artifice — it’s all jealousy, lust and insecurity underneath.
When Haynes (think Frasier Crane’s brother, Niles) as Algernon is wooing Woods (imagine a moody Eric Morecambe) as a self-harming Cecily with coy come-ons, Woods starts to undress Haynes.
But it’s a rare moment when the duo’s sensibilities and Wilde’s play bond. Too often we’re getting Wilde, then some funny business.
Kelly gradually escalates the quick-change antics so that both actors end up sharing the role of Lady Bracknell, hand puppets turn up as Canon Chasuble and Miss Prism, and Woods is running around in his underpants. But it’s sometimes simply like watching the Reduced Shakespeare Company trying to do a proper play.
The anarchic surprises of a Ridiculusmus show are more muted here. The thrill of the duo trying to “accommodate the mess” is not so great as the well-honed Wilde provides less “mess” to grapple with.
Ian Johns
Related pages:
.. Will Self, The Evening Standard, 16th June 2005 .. The Independent (article) April 2005