Reviewed: Truman Capote Talk Show;Bavouzet ,RTÉ NSO/Rophé; Roman Fever
Dublin Gay Theatre Festival: Truman Capote Talk Show New Theatre, Dublin
PETER CRAWLEY
A black leather swivel chair, caught in a spotlight, peers out from a dark empty space. If the accompanying music was something more ominous than New York, New York, I could swear an episode of Mastermind was about to break out.
The sole contestant in Bob Kingdom's one-man show is, of course, the writer Truman Capote, whose specialist subject is, of course, himself. And though the author will not be taking questions, he readily apportions out his life and times: from a southern boy's peripatetic search for identity, through the arch, bitchy persona that roamed celebrity-addled mid-century Manhattan, to his tragic drunken ruin, slurring out one-liners on talk shows.
First performed in 1994, the piece now looks a little shop-worn (the lighting is little more than perfunctory) but Kingdom, no stranger to character studies, certainly nails the persona. He inhabits Capote from the unmistakable quivering thin voice to the purple tint of his spectacles. As writer, he must put words in Capote's mouth - Capote's estate forbade Kingdom from any direct quotation - adapting various bons mots while honouring Capote's acidulous wit. Still, you get the niggling feeling of hearing the writer's voice but not his most substantial speech. Capote is uncharacteristically forced to borrow the words of rival Gore Vidal, for instance, while Kingdom structures the life of a literary genius around a cliché: the rise-and-fall celebrity lifespan summed up by, "Who is Truman Capote?", "Get me Truman Capote!" and, eventually, "Who is Truman Capote?" In place of quotation, we move swiftly to analysis. As Truman skims through his work, barely pausing over Breakfast at Tiffany's or even In Cold Blood, while dwelling on the beautiful people and lavish parties, he willingly distills his neuroses. The desperate need for approval spins him into gossip; gossip abuses the trust of society and makes him an outcast; isolation spurs his drinking.
"Writing is just observation and gossip given a home," he tells us. "And it makes the writer homeless." It is an admirable character sketch, but despite Kingdom's best efforts to get below the surface of Capote's celebrity, the man beneath the myth remains elusive. Ultimately, perhaps inevitably, those book-ended questions remain unanswered: who is Truman Capote?
Festival runs until May 18th. www.gaytheatre.ie
Bavouzet, RTÉ NSO/Rophé NCH, Dublin
ANDREW JOHNSTONE
Ravel Rapsodie espagnole; De Falla Nights in the Gardens of Spain; Stravinsky Rite of Spring
French conductor Pascal Rophé's fourth appearance with the RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra (and his second this season) further strengthened a strong relationship that began at the 2005 Living Music Festival.
Revolving around his specialist axis of French modernism, his two most recent programmes have taken in the season's quota of Ravel and two landmark works, Messiaen's Turangalila and Stravinsky's Rite of Spring.
Rophé is one of the increasing number of conductors to dispense entirely with a baton. Far from the frantic stabbings that can make a poor substitute for time-honoured stick technique, his direction is graceful, generous, and so fluid you'd swear he has a ball-and-socket joint at each elbow.
The qualities of pianist Jean-Efflam Bavouzet, who was making his début with the NSO, were of a different kind. The solo part of de Falla's sensuous and aristocratic Nights in the Gardens of Spain calls mostly for short bursts of activity which, for all his rapt concern with the music's broad sweep, Bavouzet tackled with a certain splashy athleticism. Rophé, however, combined a commanding view of the whole score with a keen eye for orchestral detail, establishing a colourful and convincing context for Bavouzet's wildly exciting forays.
The RTÉ NSO's last performance of the Rite, under principal conductor Gerhard Markson in 2005, was among this orchestra's most notable achievements in recent years. Now, after a polished first half, expectations ran high. Rophé did not disappoint. Though there was none of the blended luminosity that had characterised Ravel's Rapsodie espagnole and the de Falla, instead came a brutally energetic assurance that this seminal revolution of 20th-century music is alive, kicking, and angry. Though the playing could be rough, it was uncontainably ready.
Roman Fever Bewley's Theatre, Dublin
GERRY COLGAN
Edith Wharton, who died in 1937, left behind a substantial output of poems, novels and stories, but apparently no plays. Hugh Leonard borrowed her story Roman Fever in 1983, and turned it into an effective one-act drama, which it remains in this production directed by Michael James Ford.
Two American widows, friends since girlhood, are holidaying in Rome, basking on a sunlit terrace. Mrs Slade is tall, handsome and patronising; Mrs Ansley is shorter, easygoing and plain. We learn that they are there with their daughters - one apiece - who are away for the day. As they talk, an uneasy sense of old grievances begins to simmer beneath the surface.
Ansley's daughter has a promising thing going with a titled Italian aristocrat. Slade envies this, and begins to seethe with resentment when she learns that marriage is actually in the offing, and that her friend has been invited to live with the couple in Rome. Hell hath no fury like an American matron outclassed, and Slade knows how to reassert her supremacy. From their joint past, she unleashes a missile fuelled with jealousy and destructive in intent.
But Ansley has a devastating counter that gives the play its shock ending. The play's symmetries tend to blueprint the contrasting characters of the women, the opposite natures of their daughters, and the sting in the tail that provides the old one-two of the ending. We are offered crafted entertainment, rather than revelations of human nature, for a beguiling 35 minutes or so. The acting, by Maria Tecce and Helen Norton, is impeccable, and Jack Kirwan's design creates the right sunlit atmosphere. Bewley's is currently a good bet.
Runs until May 24th.
Girl Jonah: This Two/I Was A Knife Thrower's Assistant Project Arts Centre - Cube
SEONA Mac RÉAMOINN
Two dancers, two works; both seamless duets which in separate ways created quirky atmospheric worlds where difference and sameness in physical movement were explored. Girl Jonah, in Dublin Dance Festival, imaginatively mined the concept of collaboration to create a unique and magical way of making dance that underlined its humanity and grace for all artists.
They revelled in the contrasts of their two bodies as they attempted to mirror each other's movements; they followed each other's detailed gestures with syncronicity or counterpointed effect, whether from Caroline Bowditch's wheelchair-bound perspective, or the vertical mobility of Fiona Wright.
We became the galvanised third eye, watching their parallel traits of body and voice, text and even song. Arm and upper-body dances elaborated and extended into phases of grounded leg and floor manoeuvres. They moved singly, but more often in unison, as togetherness became a constant.
The first piece, This Two, was the first fruit of the partnership of these two artists, one Australian, one British, one disabled, one not.
With merely a jug of steaming water and a metal reflective tray as props, their mellow intuitive dance of word and movement seduced us into imagining a watery world of mermaids and floating limbs, where opposing physical abilities coalesced. As they both delicately exposed their toes and rolled up their trousers, I could almost taste the tang of the sea.
By contrast, this mellow world of the sea was abandoned for their second performance, which received its premiere at the DDF. The title alone recalls those travelling acts which toured American goldrush towns, peddling quack medicines or conjuring feats. The advertisement for the Knife Thrower's Assistant had probably read "must have long legs or nerves of steel, preferably both", Bowditched mused.
Deliciously costumed in turquoise and chocolate-brown satin tasselled shorts and revealing tops, the two shared the fantasy and the irony of this female icon whose fame (and life) depended on her ability to remain perfectly still. It was all humorously complemented by their take on James Taylor's lyrics on cowboy life in Sweet Baby James and assorted strains of other songs, murmured in perfect unison.
