REVIEW: The Lavender Hill Mob at the Everyman Theatre
The Lavender Hill Mob
Adapted by Phil Porter from the screenplay by T.E.B. Clarke
Directed by Jeremy Sams
Everyman Theatre, Cheltenham
Tuesday, 18 October 2022
Rating: ★★★☆☆
Ask any actor to play a character who can’t act, and they’ll sink their teeth into it like a Jack Russell with a juicy squirrel. Plays-within-plays offer thespians all sorts of opportunities to give the tree-rat a jolly good shake – especially when the ‘inner’ play is an am-dram production.
The play-within-a-play is a time-honoured device. You’ll find it in The Spanish Tragedy, Hamlet, Love’s Labour’s Lost, The Taming of the Shrew, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Women Beware Women, The Critic, The Seagull, The Caucasian Chalk Circle, The Habit of Art and (best of the bunch, IMHO) The Muppet Movie.
Phil Porter’s stage adaptation of T.E.B. Clarke’s 1951 Ealing comedy is the latest addition to this canon. The ‘outer’ play is set on New Year’s Eve 1949 in the Union Club, Rio de Janeiro, a watering hole for British ex-pats. Henry ‘Dutch’ Holland – a Ronnie Biggs avant la lettre – persuades his posh chums to re-enact the story of his audacious heist, for the benefit of an interloper who everyone but Henry mistakes for a movie director.
In the multiple plays-within-a-play that ensue, comic stereotypes abound, tongues are lodged firmly in cheeks, and characterisations are as broad as Eric Pickles and as shallow as Liz Truss. Much mileage is derived from middle-class characters pretendin’ to be sarf Lunnon criminuws. The gawblimey is strong, as are ze Fraunch aksaunts. There’s much reliance on what you might call ‘headwear acting’: bowler hat equals Bank Clerk; flat cap equals Petty Criminal Type One; trilby equals Petty Criminal Type Two; kepi equals French Douanier; straw boater equals Schoolgirl; headscarf equals Little Old Lady; policeman’s helmet equals … You get the idea.
Full disclosure: I’m a sucker for this stuff. Go big, or go home, says I. Slice it as thick as you can. I’ll be rolling in the aisle and begging for more. Provided it’s done with verve and panache. Unfortunately, on the opening night, the cast seemed to lack the confidence to grab this potentially hilarious show and shake it like a squirrel. Some performances seemed tentative, and the timing was sometimes off. It was as if the actors weren’t quite sure where the laughs were, and hadn’t yet relaxed into their roles. I hope that, once the performers find their feet, this will become a better, funnier show.
This adaptation captures the charm but not the lightness of the original; and the charismatic leading actors in the screen version – Alec Guinness and Stanley Holloway – cast long shadows. Miles Jupp is characteristically simpatico as Henry Holland – but perhaps too much so. He’s missing Guinness’s mischievous twinkle, and his character’s apparent insouciance tends to diminish the essential sense of jeopardy. Justin Edwards is an experienced comic actor and an excellent choice for the role of Alfred Pendlebury (which he doubles with the British Ambassador), but his somewhat subdued performance lacks Holloway’s colourful vivacity.
Jeremy Sams’ direction is, I would suggest, a little pedestrian, and the story is sometimes unclear. Even though the show is short, it feels sluggish, as if cues are not being picked up quickly enough. Francis O’Connor’s cluttered set, while ingeniously allowing palm trees to be transformed into the Eiffel Tower, makes for laborious scene changes. These, plus the frequent toggling between ‘inner’ and ‘outer’ plays, tend to interrupt the flow of what should, and could, be a breathless comedy caper.
Running time: 1h 55m, including interval
The Lavender Hill Mob runs at the Everyman Theatre, Cheltenham, until Saturday 22 October 2022.
© 2022 Paul Sharples
Explore Gloucestershire
19 October 2022
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