Articles about theatre

The Sydney Theatre Company’s production of Julius Caesar might give you a fresh perspective on this play if you are a jaded Shakespeare watcher. If you are not, then the many quirks and production trickery might leave you first irritated, then bored, and finally both.

I often write a little review of plays or films that I see. But in this case, I will leave the commentary to the elderly orange-haired lady who was sitting in front of me. She spoke continually throughout the play, so clearly considered her opinions to be not only more important than mine, but more important than the play itself.

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Harold Pinter’s Old Times portrays unsettling mind games played amongst a middle-aged couple and a visiting friend from their separate pasts. Last weekend I saw the Sydney Theatre Company’s production of this classic play.

Deeley and Kate play host to Anna, Kate’s old friend. Almost from the beginning, Anna seems to engage Deeley in a contest for Kate’s intimacy, almost like a grown-up version of a schoolyard “bestest friend” competition. Anna mixes up the past and present while Deeley looks frustratedly on. But in the end it looks as if Anna is not in control after all.

In a way, Kate and Anna seem to be different aspects of the same person. The play expresses Deeley’s battle to repress Kate’s wilder side. Maybe Anna doesn’t really exist after all, other than as a personification of Kate’s untamed past. The presentation of the play encourages such musings.

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This absorbing drama follows the rise and fall of the man who brought down the Berlin Wall. Well, perhaps I am overstating things, but Willy Brandt, West German Chancellor in the early ’70s, was a crucial figure in the years leading up to the fall of the Berlin Wall. The play depicts the political manoeuvring going on around Brandt, particularly by his secretary Guenter Guillaume, who was also an East German double agent.

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