| A Week of Theatre Abundance |
Theatr na n'Og |
| Nye and Jennie- Nigel Jarrett at Meredydd Barker's New Play , The Metropole, Abertillery , November 18, 2017 |
The Senedd Culture Committee is in receipt of two dozen plus consultative documents in its enquiry into broadening income sources for the arts. The document range awaits a digest of the most interesting content into an accessible form for the general reader, a task that will be done before year's end. The first document opens with a summary sentence “Wales has a theatre of a quality and a scale that belies its size. No community of three million in the world has a larger. It is a record in which all concerned should take pride.” The third week of November has been testament to this efflorescence. In an example of cultural blossoming three press nights managed to be held on the same day. That for “Tiger Bay” coincided with “How to Win against History” at the Sherman and Theatr na nÓg's premiere at the Metropole. Meanwhile in the same week National Dance Company Wales was fulfilling its obligations which the “national” designation entails and taking itself to audiences. To cap a week of ridiculous overload Opra Cymru was a-travel north to south with “Wythnos Yng Nghymru Fydd”. In Aberystwyth this tiddler from Blaenau Ffestiniog left not a seat unsold. That makes five important pieces of theatre. The critical reaction to “Tiger Bay” has been revealing, of which more may be said at another time. The fissure of reaction between the reviewers in Wales itself and visitors from London has been a regular for some years. That has been the case of “Tiger Bay” and it raises the question of who actually speaks for the artists of Wales. A culture of confidence has no need for a critical thumbs-up from critics from another place. If Williams, Farrow and their vast team are a little down-in-the-dumps over the reaction from the best of Fleet Street forget it. It was a production made for Cardiff and the reviewers of Wales are those who are its foremost legitimate judges. Luckily Wales has writers where professional critics are no more. A good writer was present last month for Port Talbot's theatre event; Richard Lewis Davies gave Fluellen the critical response that was the company's due. In Abertillery Theatr na nÓg had benefit of a seasoned writer in the form of Nigel Jarrett. He gave “Nye and Jennie” a length and depth of treatment that no newspaper review would countenance. The following is a taster: “...It’s certainly a tale of Labour. The play sweeps straight into the battles fought by the two to achieve their Socialist goals, often and frustratingly against the unwanted obstacles in the Labour Party itself, which Bevan presciently grew to identify as a movement hi-jacked by middle-class intellectuals. They both shouldered the burdens of prejudice from their own clans when he took up with her after she had been having an affair with a Labour MP on the verge of divorcing as a result. These were not working-class ways, at least not the working-class they both knew, and as much in need of reform as the rest of society. But it’s all here, including the coalition years, the post-war Labour election victory, and Bevan’s later confrontations. Perhaps it’s just as well that Lee’s achievements after her husband’s death are celebrated at the start, in his absence. “...Whether or not the play is equally a tale of Love is debatable. There are some magical scenes of intimacy – a night out dancing the tango at the Café Royale; brief expressions of tenderness and attachment; Jennie’s implicit sense of impending loss as he is about to succumb to cancer and a swift death in 1960 – but nowhere does he appear ready to give himself to her physically or admit what life would be like without her. These are the tropes of romance and don’t have to be essayed as sentimental. Maybe Bevan was always too brittle with rage, even with his jacket off. He was always, as they say, incandescent with it. “...In contrast, Louise Collins’s Jennie is both, electrically alive with sexuality and political passion. Jennie & Nye. It is she who, opting for what was at the time a ‘male’ life unencumbered by housebound domestic responsibilities, actually denied herself in the interests of her husband’s career. But she supported him when he was vilified as a liar and a traitor and the two were spied on by reporters and/or MI5. In the busy lives they were leading in the public arena, such unity must have connoted warmth and affection. They were an indissoluble item. “...In around eighty minutes with no intermission, the play takes in a lot of pre- and post-war British history...He pointed out to delegates who did not want Britain to be a nuclear power – Lee’s position also – that such a policy would mean sending a Foreign Secretary, ‘whoever he might be’ naked into the conference chamber. It’s the play’s crowning example of Lee the uncompromising idealist and Bevan the politician accepting the reality that political outcome was often about compromise. Ironically again, it was this position that led to his political demise.” These extracts amount to around a quarter of Nigel Jarrett's treatment. The full review may be read on: http://www.asiw.co.uk/reviews/nye-jennie-theatr-na-nog-metropole-abertillery All quotations copyright: the author |
Reviewed by: Adam Somerset |
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