Man and Superman

George Bernard Shaw

National Theatre (Lyttelton)

17 February 2015 to 17 May 2015

Review by Amy Holley

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Shaw’s famous social manifestos are left intact in Simon Godwin’s exhilarating, thought provoking production of Man and Superman at the National Theatre, despite the modernisation from its original end of the century setting.

It’s Simon Godwin’s directorial debut for The National and he has started masterfully. In his interview with Emma Freud as part of the NT Live programme, he reveals that he was originally unsure about adapting the play to a modern setting because he was worried how the audience would respond to it. This, he says, is because the majority of George Bernard Shaw’s productions are kept in the Edwardian period. On the whole, the contemporary setting does work well with the action and philosophical debates featured in the play highlighting the universal themes. However, Godwin has the actors using mobile phones, texting, etc. as crucial elements in the play’s action and despite the modern setting the use of mobile phones did stick out like a sore thumb, but this must be because Shaw’s work is intrinsic with the Edwardian and Victorian eras.

It is Ralph Fiennes’ second appearance in the role and it was he who approached the National Theatre with the idea of staging another production of this epically long philosophical social comedy (his first production was in 1996).

Ralph Fiennes captures the energy and humour of Shaw’s irritatingly intelligent Jack Tanner and his love hate relationship with his much unwanted guardian and love interest Ann Whitefield (passionately portrayed by Indira Varma). Ann and Jack’s relationship is redolent of the comedic battle of wits that occurs in Much Ado about Nothing between Beatrice and Benedict, and as in Much Ado love eventually prevails and Jack Tanner, the anarchist, is won over by a woman, and by love.

The play depicts the human quest for love. Godwin states that it’s really about how Jack negotiates opening up to love despite his protestations that it gets in the way of the real purpose of life; contemplation. Shaw navigates the portrayal and discussion of in depth philosophical and social issues, including an examination of Heaven, Hell and Purgatory, by employing comedy which maintains the audience’s interest and Simon Godwin’s production is definitely played for laughs.

Mendoza (also The Devil), played by Tim McMullan, is insanely funny swaggering across the stage dressed up like Russell Brand out on the pull and Jack’s chauffeur, Straker (Elliot Barnes-Worrell) combines a modern East End dialect with Shaw’s scripted scrutiny of the class system with hilarious effects.

The set is simple but highly effective, centring on a moving inner set that spins around on a central pivot. The use of video support is spot on here acting as a framework to break down the fourth wall for the audience as well as adding visual variety.

This production is another example of Ralph Fiennes’ enormous talent as an actor and will surely mark the beginning of an exciting directorial career for Simon Godwin at the National. They were brave to include the often omitted Don Juan in Hell scene but it paid off in dividends greatly enriching the play’s social missives.

A Story to Make You Believe in God -
Capturing Imagination in Yann Martel’s Life of Pi (2001)

This week’s blog returns to an analysis of adaptation by examining a novel-to-film adaptation. Yann Martel’s Life of Pi is one of my favourite novels, if not my favourite! Although I have too many to be that definitive really! So for this blog I decided to return to the film and its original source with my adaptation hat on for another look.

A still from the film: Pi alone in the Pacific Ocean

The terrifying sensation of being alone, orphaned, abandoned and floating in the middle of the Pacific Ocean is what the overwhelmingly colourful Life of Pi left me with when I closed the book on the last page. Not to mention the nauseating sickness that had washed over me with every mention of Pi’s ferocious feline companion! The book starts with an introduction stating that the author went to India seeking inspiration and there met an elderly man who said that he had a story that would make him ‘believe in God’. With this caveat, the novel then introduces Pi, full name Piscine Molitor Patel, and begins the story, which is an intriguing blend of fact and fiction. Pi’s journey does not keep you guessing whether the events are real life, magic or imaginary from scene to scene as in some novels that juggle the careful balance of magical realism, for instance, Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967). Martel unfolds his tale so expertly that the reader just allows him, or herself, to be carried alongside Pi and Richard Parker on the lifeboat. The most intriguing aspect of the novel is whether Pi’s surreal story is real, meaning that magic does exist in the midst of the vast Pacific Ocean, or if Pi’s account of his adventure was an unconscious psychological response to the trauma of losing his family. Whatever your opinion, how well the magic surrealism or Pi’s imaginative psychological response to his trauma was adapted for the camera was foremost in my mind when I approached the film. 

The director Ang Lee said in an interview with John Hiscock at the Telegraph in December 2012 that it had taken him two months to decide to take on the mammoth challenge 

(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/filmmakersonfilm/9728119/Ang-Lee-interview-how-he-filmed-the-unfilmable-for-Life-of-Pi.html). 

He also stated that he wanted the film to be as unique as the book, which meant “creating the film in another dimension”. 3D was a burgeoning form at the time so Ang selected 3D as the “cinematic language” through which to express his art. The difficulty would be how to film the ocean scenes especially with a live tiger to consider. The tiger issue was of course resolved with the use of outstanding quality animation and the ocean was the world’s largest self-generating wave tank in Taiwan. Practicalities aside, Lee’s approach to film making is that the work has to provoke a ‘visceral response’ in him and that he has to be moved by them. With relation to the adaptation of the novel, Ang said that he focused on the storytelling aspect of the novel, when interviewed by Alex Billington in 2012 for firstshowing.net (http://www.firstshowing.net/2012/interview-ang-lee-on-the-journey-of-bringing-life-of-pi-to-the-screen/). The novel is itself a story told by the adult Pi to the author who is seeking an inspirational story. It is therefore an illusion. And it is a testament to both the novel and the film that you forget that this is someone’s tale. There are a few times at the beginning of the film where Ang deliberately reminds the audience that they are listening to the adult Pi’s story by cutting back to Pi and the author played by Rafe Spall as they are discussing the story and eating their lunch. This frames the story reminding the audience that they are watching an illusion. The thought provoking conclusion where young Pi recounts the last few months of his life to the Japanese insurance company representatives responsible for the boat that was chewed up by the storm are obviously aware of the illusion that Pi has created. But rather than leaving the audience with the confirmation that Pi created a false reality to protect himself as he traversed the vast Pacific Ocean alone, Lee leaves this open allowing the audience to make up their own minds. Was this a story to make YOU believe in God? 

For me, yes. I am intensely aware of the two potential stories that collide in Life of Pi the novel and I swing from believing in the magical realism of a young boy existing with a live tiger to accepting his story as an unconscious response to his trauma. This lack of certainty regarding the veracity of Pi’s tale is one of the most exciting aspects of the novel and because this sense of illusion was also vital to Ang Lee when he approached adapting Life of Pi the film is as much of a success and a thrill as the original source. 

Capturing Historical Accuracy in Belle (2013)

This is a slight diversion from my usual review of adaptations, because I'm looking at historical accuracy in a period drama, however historical accuracy is something I am very interested in particularly with relation to adaptations when they appear! And I was also very eager to watch and review Belle!

I only managed to watch Belle this week despite trying to get tickets on several occasions last year. For some reason my local cinema only had showings around noon on a weekday, which is impossible when you're working and I certainly couldn't justify taking a day off to go to the cinema! The reason I was so keen to watch Belle was that I had been deeply moved when learning her story at school. I was also interested in how they intended to approach and present her as an aristocratic mixed race woman in a twenty first century film whilst also obtaining historical accuracy. Would they sex up the story Andrew Davies’ style aka Colin Firth diving into a pool in his shirt and breeches as Darcy? Or would it be a fairly dry, historical narrative? In actuality it's somewhat a mix of both approaches with the two options Belle has before her as potential husbands and romantic leads. However, it is an excellent film and was really underrated. And I really don't know why it didn't receive much publicity last year. The film opens with the statement ‘Based on a True Story’ so I was hoping for historical accuracy given that the director made such a pointed attempt to tell the viewers of the story’s veracity.

I was particularly keen to find out how the director Amma Asante had captured Eighteenth century attitudes to mixed race women, particularly a wealthy, independent, orphan woman. Amma Asante was born to Ghanaian immigrant parents in London giving her a unique and sensitive insight into the role.  The film opens with the child Belle collected by her wealthy, white, sea Admiral father from squalor and poverty in the care of a black female (possibly a slave, this is not clarified). He then takes her to his uncle’s home to be brought up with her white, illegitimate cousin as he is going on another sea mission. Before he leaves, he tells her how much he loves her and to always remember that. His love and affection for her is not supported by his aunt and uncle, who are initially shocked by the girl. However, her father, Captain Sir John Lindsay, begs his aunt and uncle to provide her with the privileges that she is due as his daughter. We know that William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield did take in his great niece and raised her as his own and the painting of the 1st Earl Mansfield’s great nieces still exists today reflecting the great affection he grew to have for both the girls. 

Painting of Belle with her cousin Elizabeth Murray, formerly attributed to Johann Zoffany, c.1779

One move away from the film’s real life counter-parts’ lives was to make Belle’s cousin Elizabeth illegitimate and to imply that because Belle’s father had recognised her as his child in his will, this took away the stigma of her illegitimate birth. This was not the case. Belle’s illegitimacy would have been as much of an issue as her race in eighteenth century, if not more so, despite her father’s recognition and inheritance. In the film, Belle even has an argument with her cousin Elizabeth about Elizabeth’s lack of success in obtaining a marriage proposal from the affluent and highly eligible James Ashford, during which Belle says that Elizabeth’s proposal was not forthcoming because she is inferior to her, because Elizabeth is illegitimate whereas Belle’s father recognised her as his child in his will. The main issue that the film raises respecting race relations in the eighteenth-century is the Earl of Mansfield’s difficult verdict on the Zong massacre in 1781. Discussions of the case punctuate the film and provoke the people surrounding the Earl of Mansfield, and later Belle herself, to question him on his understanding of the difference that race makes to humanity. The case is most succinctly summarised as whether it is right that human lives can ever be worth claimed as lost cargo. Sadly the court case revealed that the slaves were worth more to the slave traders claimed on their insurance as lost cargo than when sold as diseased slaves. The ultimate verdict, that the Earl of Mansfield as Chief Justice makes, is kept until the very conclusion of the film. His verdict was a critical decision that contributed significantly to the abolition of slavery in Britain. Whilst references to this highly important case punctuate the film, the attitudes which black women (and women) received in the eighteenth century are also identified. A particularly poignant scene captures the attitudes to both black women and women during the period. Belle is discussing the case with the young, as yet unqualified lawyer, John Davinier. She states that she has realised how lucky she is to have escaped slavery twice, as a daughter of a slave and then as an independent woman of fortune. Sadly what the film does not go on to say is that as soon as Belle marries, she would in effect become slave to her husband as the marriage laws of the country did not recognise married women as independent of their husbands. Married women had NO legal identity. A married woman could run up debts in her husband’s name, could not vote (obviously!), could not inherit (all and any inheritance would go to her husband), could not pass on an inheritance, her husband could dispose of her property at will and any money earned by a married woman was also legally the husband’s. Ironically, if Belle decided to marry, she would at that point become more of a slave than she had ever been before despite her origins. It’s a pity that the film does not go into this in further detail, although there is only so much discussion of historical laws that you can present in a 104 minutes! This is definitely a film to watch with your historical hats on! And if you don’t have a historical hat then it’s an excellent and beautifully filmed drama anyway.