A 6' Ginger Cat Toasting Hegelian Absolutes
Thursday, August 1st, 2002 09:25 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tamaranth"I don't understand why it's called Romanticism!" wails Natalie Beyer as, yet again, Nicholas Stankevich - a young and intense (and rather Gothic) Russian philosopher - fails to notice her flirtation. He's trying to tell her about Hegel and Kant: she's trying to tell him she's in Lurve. And we see that Tom Stoppard still has it in for philosophers. They all have a miserable time in 'Voyage', the first part of the Coast of Utopia trilogy. (See it at the National Theatre).
The staging is wonderful but occasionally nauseating. The backdrop's projected onto moving panels and doors at the back of the revolcing circular stage: and the backdrop whirls around too. The very first scene, at Premukhino - the Bakunin family estate outside Moscow - has the stage revolving clockwise while the silver birch woodland behind it moves counter-clockwise to give the impression of a journey. (We couldn't work out whether the birch wood was computer-modelled or photographed: it was three-dimensional enough to imply considerable processing power. </geek>). Later, the stage became a skate-scarred ice rink with zoological gardens receding behind it: and, wonderfully, a ship leaving Moscow: waves, bright-lit buildings on the river bank, the rush of escape.
The first act takes place entirely at Premukhino, as the Bakunin family - eventually-famous anarchist Mikhail, his parents, his four sisters in their varying degrees of beauty and intelligence - welcome a variety of suitors (for the girls) and Mikhail's friends. Most of Mikhail's friends are given to walking around intensely and uttering Philosophy, even when women are present. They discuss love and literature and politics and Army life, and a few serfs scuttle about, being casually oppressed. (Stoppard seems much exercised by the way that estates were rated in terms of 'souls' - adult male serfs - rather than acres).
The second act fits around the first like a comb interlocking with another: these are the scenes elsewhere, in Moscow and St Petersburg, which have already been discussed back at Premukhino. Concerts, dances, philosophical debates in newspaper offices: and most memorably, a fancy-dress ball:
"The guests were toasting Hegelian absolutes in champagne. Until I'd seen a six-foot ginger cat raising its glass to subjectivism I didn't understand the true meaning of exile."
Will Keen as Belinsky is paradoxically charismatic: Belinsky's a working-class literary critic ("a job for people whose second novel didn't come up to expectations") with a whiny voice and few social skills, but when he gets going his passion is infectious - and his body language is self-made man through and through. He probably steals the show from Douglas Henshall as Bakunin, though Mr Henshall is a great deal more decorative.
And it's Tom Stoppard. Even the deep philosophical stuff is riddled with one-liners and sly asides. Who knew Kant could be so entertaining?
'Shipwreck' tonight, 'Salvage' tomorrow. (Sleep Saturday).
The staging is wonderful but occasionally nauseating. The backdrop's projected onto moving panels and doors at the back of the revolcing circular stage: and the backdrop whirls around too. The very first scene, at Premukhino - the Bakunin family estate outside Moscow - has the stage revolving clockwise while the silver birch woodland behind it moves counter-clockwise to give the impression of a journey. (We couldn't work out whether the birch wood was computer-modelled or photographed: it was three-dimensional enough to imply considerable processing power. </geek>). Later, the stage became a skate-scarred ice rink with zoological gardens receding behind it: and, wonderfully, a ship leaving Moscow: waves, bright-lit buildings on the river bank, the rush of escape.
The first act takes place entirely at Premukhino, as the Bakunin family - eventually-famous anarchist Mikhail, his parents, his four sisters in their varying degrees of beauty and intelligence - welcome a variety of suitors (for the girls) and Mikhail's friends. Most of Mikhail's friends are given to walking around intensely and uttering Philosophy, even when women are present. They discuss love and literature and politics and Army life, and a few serfs scuttle about, being casually oppressed. (Stoppard seems much exercised by the way that estates were rated in terms of 'souls' - adult male serfs - rather than acres).
The second act fits around the first like a comb interlocking with another: these are the scenes elsewhere, in Moscow and St Petersburg, which have already been discussed back at Premukhino. Concerts, dances, philosophical debates in newspaper offices: and most memorably, a fancy-dress ball:
"The guests were toasting Hegelian absolutes in champagne. Until I'd seen a six-foot ginger cat raising its glass to subjectivism I didn't understand the true meaning of exile."
Will Keen as Belinsky is paradoxically charismatic: Belinsky's a working-class literary critic ("a job for people whose second novel didn't come up to expectations") with a whiny voice and few social skills, but when he gets going his passion is infectious - and his body language is self-made man through and through. He probably steals the show from Douglas Henshall as Bakunin, though Mr Henshall is a great deal more decorative.
And it's Tom Stoppard. Even the deep philosophical stuff is riddled with one-liners and sly asides. Who knew Kant could be so entertaining?
'Shipwreck' tonight, 'Salvage' tomorrow. (Sleep Saturday).
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Deeply facile response
Date: Thursday, August 1st, 2002 03:30 am (UTC)However, I concur that it's a splendid production so far. I had no idea, as I struggled with philosophy at university, that it could be so much fun.
M.
Facile is Fun
Date: Thursday, August 1st, 2002 04:18 am (UTC)Henshall's decorative in that aristrocratic blond Russian way that I found so appealing in David McCallum, in 'The Man from U.N.C.L.E.'. In fact, Raymond Coulthard as gothy Stankevich is probably most like my type, in terms of looks: but I'd hate to be predictable. Herzen, I'm afraid, just looked too much like an unwashed Socialist Worker vendor for me.
Re: Facile is Fun
Date: Saturday, August 3rd, 2002 09:07 am (UTC)Less facility to follow later, I think.
M.
Thank you...
Date: Sunday, August 4th, 2002 09:58 am (UTC)