Let’s be honest. We all knew it was going to be hard to beat the 1987 film with truly star turns by Michael Douglas, Glenn Close and Anne Archer. Even with Trevor Nunn’s direction and a line up including Natasha McElhone (playing Alex Forrest the “mistress”. My companion immediately identified her from the US TV series Californication), Kristin Davis (playing Beth the wife in her West End debut after her role as Charlotte in Sex and the City) and Mark Bazeley (playing Dan Gallagher).
So. In its favour I can commend the alternative ending and the slick sophisticated sliding sets (I particularly liked the bar, restaurant, garage and country house scenes).
Natasha McElhone’s transition from attractive professional woman to unstable “psycho girl” was fast and credible and, at times, powerful – maybe this production gave the character more depth. Perhaps there was a missed angle about Alex and why she became “lonely” - a reflection of her age and the nature of City life? Or maybe even the extent to which seriously disturbed people are all around us? The Madam Butterfly theme was well managed – nice to hear that music at full blast without being at the opera.
But otherwise I was a bit disappointed. It felt stilted and tortured – but for the wrong reasons – the pacing seemed off and so the tension didn’t build. There was quite a lot of dialogue around “our legal work in publishing”. The all-important sex scenes were practically non-existent - replaced by a (symbolic?) clubbing scene instead. I had trouble connecting with the characters and the US accents felt uncomfortable. And the narrative to the audience with flashbacks didn’t work for me.
Thankfully, the famous bunny boiler scene was preserved – and both the “aahs” at the live bunny and the screams at its demise were authentic. I suppose it did work well in prompting thoughts and exploring ideas about when is right wrong and wrong right? It took us on some twists and turns of different perspectives in that. It could have been given a wider context - what happens when basically good people with reasonable intentions do something wrong or get out of their depth?
I don’t think I was alone in my views – the applause at the end was polite rather than rapturous. My companion was more damning – I won’t share his comments about Cuprinol and candyfloss.
http://www.trh.co.uk/whatson/fatal-attraction/ until 21 June 2014
