Richard Eyre2011-2020DramaHenrik IbsenPerformanceUnited Kingdom

Henrik Ibsen & Richard Eyre – Ghosts: Almeida Theatre (2014)

Ghosts Almeida Theatre (2014)
Ghosts Almeida Theatre (2014)

The Telegraph: “I trudged to this production with all the enthusiasm of a schoolboy making his way to a double maths lesson on a dank Monday morning.

One of the peculiarities of my job is that you are sometimes required to see the same play twice in close proximity, and it was only last week that I endured Stephen Unwin’s punishingly dour production of Ghosts (1881) at the Rose Theatre in Kingston. The idea of a second dose of a work that is grim even by Ibsen’s demanding standards felt almost unendurable.

But Richard Eyre’s superb staging, in his own fleet and vivid adaptation, held me in its grip throughout. Unlike Unwin, he stages the piece without an interval, so that the dramatic tension isn’t dissipated, but the real difference is the in-the-moment intensity of the acting.

It is a production that creates a strong sense of impending doom, and when the worst happens, as we know it must, it does so with a raw, unbuttoned passion that leaves one reeling. The dramatic effect is exactly the opposite of Unwin’s production. There the play’s climax seemed merely depressing. Here one feels unexpectedly elated by the reckless emotional truth of both Ibsen’s play and the superb performances of the actors.

But as well as penetrating to the dark heart of a drama that deals with the syphilis a son has inherited through the debauched sins of his father, Eyre also finds a good deal of dark humour in the piece.
Related Articles

As Pastor Manders, the self-anointed spiritual adviser to Helene Alving and her troubled son Oswald, Will Keen hilariously suggests a man who is convinced of his own rightness while getting things spectacularly wrong. With his grating voice, bald, dome-like head and strange nervous hand gestures, this sanctimonious cleric is irresistibly entertaining even though the consequences of his actions invariably prove malign.

There are also fine comic touches in the performances of Brian McCardie as the disreputable builder, Engstrand, who ruthlessly exploits the Pastor’s almost criminal gullibility and Charlene McKenna as Engstrand’s daughter, a pert maid who hopes to win Oswald’s heart with her facility in French.

The heart of the play though is the relationship between Lesley Manville as Mrs Alving and Jack Lowden as her ailing, anguished son. Manville presents the mother with an extraordinary sense of accumulated tension, capturing a woman who is haunted by bitter memories of the past and fearful of dreadful developments still to come. She also movingly reveals Mrs Alving’s courage in finally acknowledging that her own part in the family tragedy hasn’t been without blame.

Meanwhile Jack Lowden, big, shambolic and increasingly distraught as her bohemian artist son, conveys the ugly egotism of the chronically sick, and the sheer terror of his terrible illness. The play’s closing moments are almost too upsetting to watch.

Tim Hatley’s design, with translucent walls that make people in the adjoining room actually look like ghosts, and Peter Mumford’s often dramatic lighting, with the play ending in a blood-red dawn, both add greatly to the intensity of a production that does full justice to this thrilling, harrowing play.”

Ghosts Almeida Theatre (2014)
Ghosts Almeida Theatre (2014)
Ghosts Almeida Theatre (2014)
Ghosts [Almeida Theatre 2014].mkv

General
Container:  	Matroska
Runtime: 	1 h 36 min
Size: 	1.41 GiB
Video
Codec: 	x264
Resolution: 	1024x576 
Aspect ratio:  	16:9
Frame rate: 	25.000 fps
Bit rate: 	1 900 kb/s
BPP: 	0.129
Audio
#1:  	English 2.0ch AC-3 @ 192 kb/s

https://nitro.download/view/F26E3A68092BEFC/Ghosts_Almeida_Theatre_1.mkv

Language(s):English
Subtitles:None

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Back to top button