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Vincent in Brixton.
- Tour & Scottish Premiere.
World premiere of play and this National Theatre Production at National
Theatre, London on 1 May 2002.
Playwright - Nicholas Wright.
Director - Richard Eyre.
Designer - Tim Hatley.
Lighting Designer - Peter Mumford.
Music - Dominic Muldowney.
Sound Designer - Neil Alexander.
Asssociate Director - James Kerr.
Company - A co-production between the National Theatre and Ambassador
Theatre Group .
Cast - here .
2003 Tour Dates and Times - here .
Seen to review at King's Theatre Glasgow, 29 September 2003..
Run Time - 2 hours 30 mins including one interval.
Reviewer - Thelma Good.
Vibrant Infusion.
What makes a genius? Nicholas Wright's Olivier Award winning play makes
you realise how some are not born to greatness but find it out of the
broken shards of a future they tried to create. The young Van Gogh goes
to engage lodgings in Brixton. It's a booking his landlady Mrs Loyer almost
instantly has second thoughts about.
The young man is correct, he says he's "too forward in his feelings"
adding I "speak my mind too bluntly". Before he even moves in
he declares to Mrs Loyer he loves her daughter Eugenie. Most mothers would
have sent him away then, but this is not a conventional house, despite
her black widow's clothes and the young boys school she runs with her
daughter. Her other lodger, Sam Plowman, who's preparing his portfolio
for his application for an art college scholarship, tells the young art
dealer Vincent nothing is as it seems in the house.
Directed by Richard Eyre and lit with painterly colour washes by Peter
Mumford, the cast achieve the mood this play needs. Its essence distilled
into the silences, the half looks and the images of longing, colliding
desires and deep, deep love. Tension is a strong hue in the production
so the play becomes the world you and the actors are both in. On the stove
of the Brixton kitchen you see the kettle steam and tins sizzle, only
the aroma of cooking and chopped vegetables is missing. Between scenes
and at moments of tenderness fragments of piano music and birdsong add
to the infusion of our senses.
Clare Higgins is the complex, mature, deeply sensual centre to
the play, Mrs Loyer. Higgins' performance shines and astonishes,
so alive despite her having played this role since the premier in May
2002. It's a wonderful role for woman, showing how this age group are
fascinating in their layers of past living. Newcomer for the UK tour,
Dutch actor Ruben Brinkman delights with his Van Gogh - awkward,
gauche with urgent movements and increasingly disordered red hair, at
times brimming with the ferment of unvented creative urges. The childlike
rosy cheeked character's directness, speaking what should not be said,
endears. Just occasionally Brinkman's Van Gogh nearly loses comprehension
when Van Gogh's probably authentic accented English is rendered too thickly.
Emma Darwall-Smith and Charlie Watts provide fine support
as the not totally losing their heads young pair, Eugenie and lodger Sam.
Arriving in the second half is the comical delight of Amy Darcy's
Anna Van Gogh, Vincent's younger and even more direct,clumping about sister
. All the cast add to the production's composition, so a possible past
is made real and enthralling on stage.
Sometimes UK tours of award winning plays or West End hits can be very
faded and cynical copies of originally finely created masterpieces. This
UK tour of Vincent in Brixton, where Clare Higgins is joined by an otherwise
new cast has fine pace and atmosphere - it's a vibrant experience.
© Thelma Good 29 September 2003. - Published on EdinburghGuide.com
Cast: Ursula Loyer - Clare Higgins, Vincent
Van Gogh - Ruben Brinkman, Eugenie Loyer - Emma Darwall-Smith, Sam Plowman
- Charlie Watts and Anna Van Gogh - Amy Darcy. Piano - Dominic Saunders.
2003 Tour Details of National Theatre/ATG's
production of Vincent in Brixton .
Tour continues
29 Sept - 4 Oct at 7:30pm Wed & Sat Mats at 2:30pm Glasgow
King's Theatre 0141 240 1111.
6 - 11 Oct at Woking New Victoria Theatre.
13 - 18 Oct at Coventry Warwick Arts Centre 024 76 524524.
21 - 25 Oct at 7:30pm Wed & Sat Mat at 2:30pm. Edinburgh
King's Theatre 0131 529 6000.
27 Oct- 1 Nov at Belfast Grand Opera House 028 90 241919.
3 Nov - 8 Nov at Stoke-on-Trent Regent Theatre 01782 213800.
17 - 22 Nov at Oxford The Playhouse 01865 798600.
24 - 29 Nov at Richmond, Richmond Theatre 020 8940 0088.
Tour ends.
Theatre Editor, Thelma Good's e-mail is
thelma@edinburghguide.com
Although every effort has been taken to ensure the accuracy of the
information presented in these pages, no responsibility can be accepted
for any errors or omissions.
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