STUNNING THE PUNTERS

STUNNING THE PUNTERS

George Dillon at the Cramphorn Theatre

03.10.16

George Dillon, master of the dramatic monologue, brought his trilogy to the Cramphorn this week.

Robert Sproat's piece gives the show its title: a darts player in a pub on “a rough old estate”, red braces, DMs, Milwall supporter, thinks philosophically back on racist graffiti and the lads who sprayed it. Totally convincing physically, slightly less so vocally and mentally.

The evening opens with a Berkoff piece, Master of Cafe Society. H, an out-of-work actor envies those with jobs, as “hunger calibrates the day with purpose”. Excellent supporting characters, especially his crumpled parents, and a touching insight to the spiritual anguish of an embittered, empty man.

The longest piece last: Dostoevsky's Dream of a Ridiculous Man. Much more ambitious, with lighting, props and sound used to support the testament of a would-be suicide who's seen a world without sin or science, but inadvertently corrupts this other Eden, a paradise lost. The changes of mood, and style, are navigated with consummate skill. I found his impassioned belief in a better world, and his guilt and uncertainty, strangely moving.

This work was first seen in Edinburgh back in 1990, and returned there this year. A real theatrical tour-de-force – 90 minutes without a break – which should be required viewing for anyone who appreciates the actor's art. Tragic, then, that in Chelmsford the performer and the theatre staff outnumbered the punters ...

THE MAN WHO WAS HAMLET

George Dillon at the Cramphorn

24.09.09

Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford, favourite of the Virgin Queen, resident of Hedingham castle. And author of the plays and poems usually attributed to Shakespeare.

Or so many of his fans, following the eminent John Thomas Looney, would have us believe.

In this fascinating one man show, George Dillon has de Vere come back from the dead to tell his history, pointing up the parallels with the Prince of Denmark, but without explicitly making any claims.

The audience are to “sit in judgement”, it seems, as Edward, like Faustus with “one bare hour to live”, travels in his “mind's eye” from Castle Hedingham to Cecil House, from Venice to Verona to Illyria. He paraphrases Hamlet, colourfully insults Sir Philip Sidney on the tennis court, and twice meets the Stratford simpleton who is fit only to hold his horses.

We meet Lord Burghley, Arthur Golding, the pope in Rome, George the clown, as well as the Virgin Queen and the 16th Earl, his father, whose death unhinged the boy.

A clever conceit, compellingly delivered, with Dillon's clear diction encompassing bleeding chunks of the canon, cod Shakespeare and modern asides. The anachronisms were effective - I was less happy about the solecisms - maybe a script editor ? The piece was directed by Denise Evans, with music by Charlotte Glasson.

It may not make Oxfordians of us all, but we may well wonder, with Bernardo, “Is not this something more than fantasy !”.

“O God! What a wounded name, Things standing thus unknown, I leave behind me! In this harsh world draw thy breath in pain, To tell my story!”

Hamlet / Edward de Vere