Skip to main content

Jekyll & Hyde

Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh

Five stars

Whatever literary purists might say, the poor things, classic fiction has always been up for grabs in terms of reinvention. This is certainly the case with Robert Louis Stevenson’s nineteenth century gothic novella, a short, sharp shocker that over more than a century now has been reimagined in many ways. Gary McNair’s new rendering sees the current master of the solo show shake Stevenson’s yarn to troubling new life in a slow burning monologue that cuts through to the dark heart of the secrets that lurk within us all.

 

Michael Fentiman’s production begins quietly enough, as Forbes Masson returns to the Lyceum stage for the first time in two decades to offer up a disclaimer that ends up framing the show, much as the sudden snaps of light and shade do between scenes. It is as if a series of Victorian peep show portraits were being immortalised on Max Jones’ picture frame set. Whether for posterity or evidence, Masson’s confessional as Utterson, the lawyer who bears witness to his friend Jekyll’s ultimately self destructive exploration of what lies beneath his nice guy façade, is a beguiling and all too appropriate double bluff.  

 

As with Stevenson’s original, all of this is reported to the audience at a remove that makes for a captivatingly creepy experience. Bathed in Richard Howells’ sepulchral light, with the low rumble of Richard Hammerton’s sound design underscoring Utterson’s litany, Masson’s tone throughout the play’s taut seventy minutes is quietly conspiratorial. Without any need for hammy horror theatrics, this makes for a hypnotic piece of storytelling writ large.

 

The shock here in Fentiman’s Reading Rep Theatre production comes from what we don’t see, even as Utterson’s secret self is laid bare along with that of everybody else. Purists may be irked, but this intimate interpretation of Stevenson by Masson and McNair (Victor and Gary, anyone?) plumbs the torrid depths of the human soul in a breathtaking display of sustained theatrical bravura.


The Herald, January 18th, 2023

 

ends

 

 

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Losing Touch With My Mind - Psychedelia in Britain 1986-1990

DISC 1 1. THE STONE ROSES   -  Don’t Stop 2. SPACEMEN 3   -  Losing Touch With My Mind (Demo) 3. THE MODERN ART   -  Mind Train 4. 14 ICED BEARS   -  Mother Sleep 5. RED CHAIR FADEAWAY  -  Myra 6. BIFF BANG POW!   -  Five Minutes In The Life Of Greenwood Goulding 7. THE STAIRS  -  I Remember A Day 8. THE PRISONERS  -  In From The Cold 9. THE TELESCOPES   -  Everso 10. THE SEERS   -  Psych Out 11. MAGIC MUSHROOM BAND  -  You Can Be My L-S-D 12. THE HONEY SMUGGLERS  - Smokey Ice-Cream 13. THE MOONFLOWERS  -  We Dig Your Earth 14. THE SUGAR BATTLE   -  Colliding Minds 15. GOL GAPPAS   -  Albert Parker 16. PAUL ROLAND  -  In The Opium Den 17. THE THANES  -  Days Go Slowly By 18. THEE HYPNOTICS   -  Justice In Freedom (12" Version) ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Myra Mcfadyen - An Obituary

Myra McFadyen – Actress   Born January 12th 1956; died October 18th 2024   Myra McFadyen, who has died aged 68, was an actress who brought a mercurial mix of lightness and depth to her work on stage and screen. Playwright and artistic director of the Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh, David Greig, called McFadyen “an utterly transformative, shamanic actor who could change a room and command an audience with a blink”. Citizens’ Theatre artistic director Dominic Hill described McFadyen’s portrayal of Puck in his 2019 production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre in London as “funny, mischievous and ultimately heartbreaking.”   For many, McFadyen will be most recognisable from Mamma Mia!, the smash hit musical based around ABBA songs. McFadyen spent two years on the West End in Phyllida Lloyd’s original 1999 stage production, and was in both film offshoots. Other big screen turns included Rob Roy (1995) and Our Ladies (2019), both directed by Mi...
1 comment
Read more

The Passage – Hip Rebel Degenerates: Black, White and Red All Over

Prelude – The Power of Three   Fear. Power. Love. This life-and-death (un)holy trinity was the driving force and raisons d’être of The Passage, the still largely unsung Manchester band sired in what we now call the post-punk era, and who between 1978 and 1983 released four albums and a handful of singles.    Led primarily by composer Dick Witts, The Passage bridged the divide between contemporary classical composition and electronic pop as much as between the personal and the political. In the oppositional hotbed of Margaret Thatcher’s first landslide, The Passage fused agit-prop and angst, and released a song called Troops Out as a single. The song offered unequivocal support for withdrawing British troops from Northern Ireland.    They wrote Anderton’s Hall, about Greater Manchester’s born again right wing police chief, James Anderton, and, on Dark Times, rubbed Brechtian polemic up against dancefloor hedonism. On XOYO, their most commercial and potentially mo...
Post a Comment
Read more