This is a beautiful play, wonderfully presented.
Written by Olivia Clement and directed by Lucinda Gleeson, it’s an exemplar of the grand tradition of drama.
(Perhaps there are two grand traditions. One’s the Theatre of Audacity, the type that asks to be valued because it surprises, shocks and delights. It has us say of the actors I can’t believe you stood in front of people and did that! The other grand tradition is the Theatre of Authenticity, the type that asks to be valued because of its universality, veracity and honesty. It has say of the actors You made me believe it was true.)
The Arrogance is of the second of these traditions. On the simplest level, it presents the relationship between parents and children; a relationship as close to universal as you’ll get. Amber (Whitney Richard) reflects on her relationship with her father (Alan Glover), a man she’s beginning to acknowledge verbally and physically abused her when she was little. She’s also making friends with her new neighbour (Linden Wilkinson) and learns that she too has had a problematic relationship with her child. But, true to the Janus-like visage of the human condition, as we look into the past, we must still look to the future. Amber is pregnant. That most fundamental, most fractious, of relationships is about to begin once again.
When I praise the Theatre of Authenticity, and this most marvellous example of it, what most impresses me is its unflinching gaze. It refuses to polish to unrecognizability the crooked timber of humanity: it records what’s messed up, what’s contradictory, what’s irresolvable. Philip Larkin famously wrote “They fuck you up, your mum and dad.” Adrian Mitchell replied with his playful parody “They tuck you up.” Drama of authenticity shows how both experiences can happen simultaneously.
And there’s another tension portrayed brilliantly in this piece. It’s about the contingency of judgement. We’ve all been told you shouldn’t judge people. And we’ve all been told there are times you most definitely should. Amber has to make such a judgement, but once she’s begun she has difficulty knowing when to stop. She falls into the error of lumping people together (an error endemic to our sociologically obsessed age.) There are few cries more tragic, more wrong-headed and more wrong-hearted, than You are all the same!
To suit the play’s commitment to both truth and its complexity, designer Soham Apte gives us a simple playing area, one evoking a garden, but soaked in dark hues, a place symbolic of the contradictory connotations of digging – it’s both a place to plant, and a place to bury.
Gleeson draws from her cast performances of glorious, unadorned honesty. At a mere 70 minutes, nothing is hurried, nothing forced – and truth is laid bare.
Paul Gilchrist
The Arrogance by Olivia Clement
At KXT on Broadway until 10 Aug
Image by Georgia Brogan
Theatre Red 