THE TRANSATLANTIC MAGAZINE
THE TRANSATLANTIC MAGAZINE
By August Strindberg; adapted by Howard Brenton
Orange Tree Theatre, 1 Clarence Street, Richmond, TW9 2SA until October 11, 2025
This Strindberg is produced far less often than Miss Julie or Dance of Death but the Orange Tree is a perfect setting for the intense 3-hander, and artistic director Tom Littler, who directs here, is a dab hand at producing utterly compelling and perfectly cast revivals of the more neglected classics. He first staged this at his previous berth in Jermyn Street Theatre as part of a cycle of Strindberg plays, all adapted by the great Howard Brenton.
What makes this production fly is the casting of Charles Dance, Geraldine James and Nicholas Farrell, reuniting them from the legendary TV series The Jewel in the Crown (has it really been 40 years!), and it's a joy to see these three, always reliably brilliant, actors, up close and at the top of their game.
Part of the caution with reviving this play has been the idea that it's merely misogynist, with Strindberg tarred with the same brush, a ridiculously reductionist approach. The play isn't, but its central villain Gustav (Dance) is undoubtedly an off-the-scale woman hater and while his rants are jarring to modern ears they're no doubt not untypical of his time and class. Strindberg however balances all that by making him meet his match in the character of Tekla (Geraldine James), an enthralling, wise and worldly character who epitomes what for 1888 was a 'modern woman'. The play is a direct challenge to Gustav's ideas.
Adolf (Nicholas Farrell) is an unremarkable painter/sculptor, hopelessly in love with his new wife Tekla, but who, during a stay in a quiet seaside hotel, has a chance encounter with a persuasive stranger that begins to unravel everything he thought he knew, not just about her but also about his own sense of self. As the seed of Iago-like suspicion takes root, his loyalty to her is tested and matters begin to unravel.
A c. 90 minute one-acter, the first third is the encounter between the two men (condensed down from what would have been a week of conversations), the second is Adolf then confronting the returned Tekla with his new-found knowledge, and the third is her startling confrontation with Gustav, whom the audience has already figured out is her ex-husband. He's been stalking the pair in the hotel. Adolf, having never met Gustav before, is oblivious, but being easily swayed is taken in by the clever man's manipulations.
The play deftly explores what could be termed the emotional ledger of a marriage, the accommodations made, the rendering of self, or the arrogant claim to have "made" the other partner. Towards the end, Tekla challenges Gustav directly as to whether the damage he has wrought was merely because she had hurt his vanity. He says no, but what he wants back is his "honor". He is still smarting at the jibes of students and colleagues after she had left him.
Dance as you'd expect is magnificently steely and runs through the gullible Adolf like a knife though butter. If anything, he seems way too confident for the cuckolded classics professor he plays. Farrell, in a wonderfully physical performance, perfectly embodies the needy, narcissistic, artist, whose selfishness is all-consuming. James' Tekla provides light relief and bursts in like a life-force, resplendent in a golden gown, seemingly well used to managing her husband's moods. James perfectly calibrates the emotional degradation her character has to endure from these two Alpha males.
Louie Whitemore's costumes of summer linens are perfectly Nordic as is the furniture, all bright blues and whites, for this sunny hotel conservatory room.
Strindberg was the father of naturalism on stage but here the dialogue is at times intensely un-naturalistic as characters analyse and verbalise all their emotions. Littler keeps the pace up though, and draws great performances from his cast. The roles here are usually played by much younger actors but his decision to cast it 'age-blind' works perfectly as this trio provide a masterclass in performance.
