Incest, Murder, Gore and Blasphemy

Thursday, 23 February 2012

TIS PITY SHE’S A WHORE

Barbican Silk Street Theatre

Declan Donnellan has two Cheek by Jowl companies, one English, the other Russian. Last year he was at the Barbican with a marvellous production of Shakespeare’s The Tempest in Russian.

He’s back with a production of John Ford’s Italianate tale (circa 1629) of incest between brother and sister in English. There is no tragedy, only lurid melodrama with a sensational finale when a ripped-out heart is brought on stage.

The grisly and bloody excesses of Jacobean drama are often hard for a modern audience to stomach. Here there is a bathroom off-stage, half visible when the door is open and all the horrors go on in the half the audience cannot see. (How very Greek!)

The action is set in modern times and takes place entirely in a girl’s bedroom, which is dominated centre stage by a bed with red sheets. The walls are covered with old movie posters.

Donnellan’s production is always interesting to look at and makes far more impact than any individual performance. The story-line is not that clear. Male torsos are regularly bared.

All the actors are used as a chorus and are liable to dance vigorously to a thudding rap beat and group and pose for a recreation of a renaissance religious painting.