| Playing Burton- |
Richard Burton |
| Playing Burton Productions , Wales Millenium Centre , December 15, 2004 |
| Few would doubt that Richard Burton (née Jenkins) had a fascinating and, in some ways, a fulfilling life. He did become a great actor and was obviously a man of great charm and a fluent conversationalist when circumstances were favourable. In bringing him back, from the actors’ heaven, wherever that might be, to the stage and on this occasion back to a brand new stage in Wales Mark Jenkins does much more than simply allow Burton, in the guise of actor, Brian Mallon, to tell his own very engaging story. He gives us a much more universal view of gifted and vulnerable manhood slipping away from a rounded and rewarding life. The writer chooses his words so carefully and polishes them until they shine like the diamonds that Burton lavishes on Taylor. Burton’s life seems to have been one of receiving many rewards for simply being himself, starting from his earliest days and continuing right up to the day he died, of cerebral haemorrhage in 1984, 58 years of age, still with many further film projects waiting to be explored. Brian Mallon has a distinct likeness to the star and carries himself in a manner that convinces us that the man we see has, in fact, endured all the highs and all the lows of this extraordinary career. Born in 1925 in Pontrhydyfen he was the twelfth of thirteen children. His mother died when he was two years old and he was brought up by his sister, ‘Cis’. “Now my sister was no ordinary woman. She became my mother and was more mother to me than any mother ever could have been.” We learn that very early on Burton felt “It was all going to happen for me.” He had no real reason to think so, his family was pretty hard up yet he felt he wanted for nothing. As a boy he had a strong sense of his Welsh roots, that never left him right up until his last days. Though I guess that the simple villages of Wales were far from his thoughts when bathing in champagne with Elizabeth Taylor, or maybe they weren’t? We begin to see in the early conversations with his mentor Phillip Burton that he is a very intelligent and thinking young man and after war service in the RAF he moves smoothly to Oxford University where the animal instinct within his very fine emerging acting ability is quickly recognised. By page fourteen of the script, Richard, now in his prime, is filming Cleopatra and having intimate conversations with Elizabeth on the telephone. His final score with women will remain unknown but the fact that he married five times demonstrates a boyish vulnerability that, amidst so many macho and successful achievements, is often disregarded. Mallon gives us a well-rounded Burton, an American actor still at times coming to terms with the English accent but as the play progresses there are moments when the look and the sound are pure Burton. He shows us a man more aware of his own shortcomings, but still happy to revel in them, than his greatest detractors. There can be no doubt that some of his work suffered as a result of his reverie but gripped with alcoholic addiction he was able to return to the West-End stage in 1970 to give an acclaimed performance in Peter Shaffer’s Equus. Such was the frustrating, inexplicable mystery of the man “Whenever I play Shakespeare, no matter what the play, I’m awe-struck by the depth of his understanding of the human soul.” Mark Jenkins has a similar depth of understanding of the human character, his thoughts will go beneath the skin of the characters he creates and his words embody them with such a rounded humanity that one starts to wonder if his Burton is even more real than the real Richard Burton. The play continues at the Wales Millennium Centre until 1st January 2005. Don’t miss it! |
Reviewed by: Michael Kelligan |
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