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Theatre: The Duchess Of Malfi

Glamour in the gloom sheds little light on dark Jacobean tragedy

The Duchess Of Malfi

Sam Wannamaker Playhouse
London SE1

3 Stars

The Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, housed within the Shakespeare Globe's complex in London, is so new to the world that it has the whiff of a Wimpey home.

Walking in, you can imagine a stage hand anxiously drying off the paintwork with a hairdryer minutes before the doors open.

But with its playful flickering light, divinely painted ceiling and simmering shadows, it's a theatre space that can easily compete with the best in London. It's a testament to architect Jon Greenfield's beautiful vision of a candlelit Jacobean playhouse.

And John Webster's canonical Duchess Of Malfi, replete with hefty moral questions on gender, class and family relations which continue to haunt modern audiences, is a fine baptismal piece for the virgin theatre.

Yet while the setting is more than dramatic enough to carry a heavyweight play such as this, it's unfortunate that the production has more discordant elements than even the tragedian intended.

Gemma Arterton is almost unbearably beguiling as the Duchess, trilling and skipping through every scene for two-thirds of the play and, insofar as this girlish and giggling interpretation goes, she renders it exquisitely.

But a play about female repression and sexual violence demands some meat on the bones.

The Duchess is one of very few fully rounded flesh-and-blood female roles in English theatre, an agent in a time which denies her agency, propositioning a marriage partner from a lower social rank and negotiating her sexual and reproductive life in the face of appalling male brutality.

A woman forbidden to marry and forced to bear three children in concealment would hardly flounce, sauce and simper her way through the court as if devoid of introspection. The palpable lack of chemistry between Arterton and her furtive amour Antonio (Alex Waldmann) makes the interpretation even more bizarre.

Neither does David Dawson ring true as her brother Ferdinand. In a performance unaccountably camped up he looks like Alan Cummings in full musical mode. He drains his supposed incestuous lust for his sister of any credibility.

Despite the lukewarm performances there are moments of astounding power.

When, Ferdinand steals into the Duchess's chamber, bristling with sex and rage, all the candles are extinguished, plunging actors and audience into shared blackness. The ensuing scene is electrifying.

And James Garnon's Cardinal is the epitome of churchy hypocrisy, with a sprinkling of brilliant comedy villain gags thrown in.

Given Webster's source material it would be very difficult to stage a truly bad production of this play and this one certainly isn't that. It enjoys flashes of brilliance and a dazzling film star at the helm. But ultimately it plays out like a series of beautifully staged tableaux, a work of sincerity, devoid of understanding.

Runs until February 16. Box office: (020) 7401-9919

Faye Lipson

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