Theatre
The National strikes gold
Published 25 September 2006
Nicholas Hytner brings Ben Jonson's London bang up to date in a fine staging
The Alchemist
Olivier Theatre, London SE1
Nicholas Hytner's production of The Alchemist is a delight. Ben Jonson's 1610 farce of scams and trickery in Jacobean London has been triumphantly updated by the National Theatre into a riotous satire set in modern-day London, involving born-again Christians, wannabe rappers, posh birds, American self-help merchants and all the other ragtag and bobtail that thrives so exuberantly in the capital. Hytner has achieved a convincing modernity not by resorting to weary tropes such as iPods, but by drawing out resounding parallels between life 400 years ago, and now.
The comedy centres on a triumvirate of con artists - Subtle, the alchemist who tricks people into thinking he can turn their pots and pans to gold; Face, who goes and finds the gullible; and Dol Common, who keeps the whole show on the road and helps out when there's a bit of seduction necessary. Face's day job is as butler to Lovewit, a respectable London gentleman, who has left the city for fear of catching the plague. So the three tricksters have the perfect venue. They move into Lovewit's home in Blackfriars and transform it into a house of games. Mark Thompson's set, a cross-section of a gentrified Georgian house, is the ideal platform. Gentrified at the front, seedy at the back, it rotates, and as the action moves around the house, so do we.
It's difficult to know who the star of The Alchemist is, but Alex Jennings and Simon Russell Beale, as Subtle and Face, respectively, have huge command of the stage and pass the baton generously between each other. Russell Beale grabs the tricky Jacobean text (there have been only a few minor rewrites) and wrestles it into comprehension. Meanwhile, Jennings dives into a dizzying array of amusing personages: a white-robed mystic, an American feng shui expert, a Scotsman in tweed, each more convincing than the last. As Subtle and Face take more and more money from an ever-growing queue of fools and the action begins to whirl, Jennings and Russell Beale chop and change accent, costume and style without resorting to cliché. Dol Common (Lesley Manville) is their perfect foil, provocative and curious, insisting on an equal stake in the whole scam.
The Alchemist takes time to set out its stall before Jonson lights the touchpaper. Happily, Nicholas Hytner has a heavenly cast for the parade of fools who come to call. Chief victim is Sir Epicure Mammon, who hopes that the alchemist will turn every piece of metal in his home to gold. Mammon is a monster, regally played by Ian Richardson. His ludicrous self-indulgence is only vaguely masked by a lazy philanthropy; he will found grammar schools and hospitals, "and now and then, a church" - but only after he has feasted on the "swelling unctuous paps/ Of a fat pregnant sow". How contemporary! With a manner of looking steadily ahead while relishing incantations of greed, Richardson is both repellent and compulsive. In a perfect touch, he tries to seduce Dol Common (believing her to be an aristocrat) by squirting Gold Spot breath freshener into his mouth.
But this is a show full of delicious cameos - Amit Shah as Drugger, the Asian corner-shop tobacconist whose anxious belief in feng shui puts daytime TV's output to shame; Tristan Beint as Kastril, the angry boy who wants to learn how to quarrel, and is given a masterclass in African-American trash talk; and most of all, Tim McMullan, who plays Sir Pertinax Surly, who is the only person to see through the scam, and yet who is ultimately trounced.
Yet The Alchemist is not a grim heist; it is a comedy, and, more than that, a comedy about London, which clearly was as hazardous and colourful in the 17th century as it is today. Indeed, by the end, when Lovewit returns to find his house surrounded by angry neighbours and foolish victims yelling for their money back, the overriding emotion is one of joy - not only at a cracking farce, but also that Jonson clearly loved London as much as the wildly applauding audience.
For further info and booking visit www.nationaltheatre.org.uk
Pick of the week
Piano/Forte
Royal Court Theatre, London SW1
New Terry Johnson drama about a Tory MP and his nightmare kids.
The Madras House
Orange Tree Theatre, Richmond
If you liked The Voysey Inheritance, catch this Harley Granville Barker play about women, sex and power.
Avenue Q
Noë Coward Theatre, London WC2
Muppet comedy that takes the squeaky-clean style of Sesame Street and makes it dirty.
Post this article to
We want to encourage people to comment on our content and to exchange views with other readers and hope this will be done on a courteous basis. However, if you encounter posts which are offensive please let us know by emailing comments@newstatesman.co.uk and we will take swift action where necessary.
