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Caroline Smith for Fabian Productions Ltd. In association with Neil McPherson for the Finborough Theatre

WEAPONS OF HAPPINESS

by Howard Brenton

Directed by Nathan Curry

Finborough Theatre

29 January to 23 February 2008

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A review by Marion Drew for EXTRA! EXTRA!

This is the first ever revival of this important play by one of Britain’s foremost political playwrights. It was first performed at the Lyttleton Theatre space at the National Theatre in 1976 and won the Evening Standard Best Play Award, and in the hands of director Nathan Curry in this production, it hasn’t lost its bite.

Haunted by memories of a bitter past, Josef Frank (Hilton McRae) finds himself in the crossfire of turbulent struggles in a London crisp factory, where workers are trying to save their jobs by occupying the building. Frank’s view, built upon his experiences of Stalinism and brutal torture in prison, so eloquently portrayed by McRae, is ultimately pessimistic “Nothing will change in England. Decay yes, change no” and his struggle is not only with himself, but with his co-workers youthful idealism. “There will never be revolution in England” he tells them, go home, learn to read, don’t get pregnant.

The open stage design (Alistair Turner) very successfully blurs the boundaries between audience and actors, making us ‘participants’ and forcing us to work at the problem, thus recharging the political interaction between stage and audience.

The cast do a fine job of facilitating the moral questioning that Brenton asks us to engage in, which, lies at the heart of the play. Key performances for me were from Benjamin Davies playing Ken, an illiterate factory worker, who delivers a consistently strong and nuanced performance, Hayward Morse as Clementis who comes into his own in the harrowing trial scene in the second half, giving us the shell of the man he once was as the Czech foreign minister, and Ben Nathan playing the roles of Miller, Commentator and Kohoutek also stood out.

Taking us back and forth between Czechoslovakia in 1952 and the London of 1976, these seamless and sometimes disorientating shifts remind us forcefully that the boundaries of history are more porous than we perhaps would like to acknowledge.

This constant relocation of the action is skillfully facilitated by an austere and simplistic set and the manipulation of versatile industrial wooden pallets, as well as bold, stark lighting (Tom White) that does an excellent job of working with space and mood.
The overall effect is to maintain the steady threatening tone of the play, particularly present in the stronger second half, and we are never for a minute let off the hook.

This is a tight production, and the sterling cast under the direction of Nathan Curry do full justice to Brenton’s strong imagery and often bitter-sweet language.

The programme provides a wealth of information for a contemporary audience, including a helpful contextualisation of political events of the same year across the world.

Tuesday to Saturday evenings: 7.30pm
Saturday and Sunday matinees: 3.00pm
TICKETS: £13, £9 cons., Tuesday evenings £9 all seats, Saturday evenings £13 all seats.

Telephone bookings: 0844 847 1652 (24 hours, no booking fees)
www.finboroughtheatre.co.uk

Finborough Theatre is above the Finborough Brasserie (currently under renovation) 118 Finborough Road, London, SW10 9ED.

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