A sun-suffused Wedgewood blue room with floor to ceiling windows and two chairs set for
conversation greet the audience. Perfect mood-setting for a long play that rarely has more than
two people on stage at a time. For all its intimacy, this is a big stage and it works very well to
convey private audiences in a huge room at Buckingham Palace. Andrew Dyce’s scenic design
and Isabella Byrd’s lighting do what they need to do.
I am British and grew up with the Royal family as a backdrop to life in London. My first memory
of living pageantry was Charles and Diana’s wedding, and my mother talked about the street
parties and crowding round the only television set in the neighborhood to watch the coronation
in 1953. I studied history and worked at many great homes and castles around England, but it is
only recently that I have become more interested in the House of Windsor. Like everybody else,
I love The Crown, and it is interesting to revisit this show after that phenomenon of a tv series. I
enjoyed connecting brief scenes in this play with whole episodes in the series. It is not often that
we get to see first versions of performances that develop into larger stories in a different
medium. It is also different watching this play after Queen Elizabeth’s reign has ended. I saw the
National Theatre Live broadcast in 2013 with Helen Mirren as the Queen at a different time.
Janet Ulrich Brooks is suitably diminutive and still as the Queen. She does well ageing from 18
to 80 (though she was a bit too sprightly for the older monarch and she often stood with her legs
apart in an un-Queen-like power stance) and her accent is almost posh enough. She reminds
me very much of both the actors Harriet Walter and Juliet Stevenson, so she obviously
convinced as British. My favorite scenes are when she talks to her child self, beautifully played
by Omi Lichtenstein, who’s accent is impeccable. She also looks very like the young Elizabeth.
The question of impersonation or interpreting the spirit of a character is a tricky one. No one
wants to see a parody or straight attempt to simply copy a real person, that conveys very little to
the audience. But on the other hand, I overheard an audience member behind me observing ‘he
looks nothing like Gordon Brown’, and so that can be off-putting too. I was impressed young
American audiences knew what Gordon Brown looked like, honestly. On the whole the cast trod
this line carefully and successfully. I liked Ron E. Rains as Harold Wilson best of all, but how
much of that is the Queen’s liking of the character, and how much is my liking the actor after his
tour-de-force in Billy Elliot this year, it’s hard to distinguish. He was the most physically present
actor on stage and his constant movement next to Brooks’ stillness created great drama.
I am not sure why this play was chosen for this audience at this moment. Perhaps it is in
homage to the late Queen and a look at a different form of enacting democracy at a critical point
for this country. The pomp and titles are gently ridiculed by all. The problematic centrality of
religion in appointing/anointing a head of state clash with the secular, humanist approach of
Wilson and Major, men from different ideologies both seeming genuinely to want to serve the
greater good, like the Queen herself. Tony Blair’s egomaniacal belief in his own (religiously
driven) rightness is well conveyed by Alex Goodrich, full grin and all. Overall this was an
enjoyable and well executed production and I encourage you to spend an evening in good
company, pondering different ways to run a country and the toll that public service takes.
The Audience is playing at Drury Lane Theatre, 100 Drury Ln, Oakbrook Terrace Il, until October 20. Tickets at 630 530 0111 and www.drurylantheatre.com
For more reviews go to https://www.theatreinchicago.com
Comments