It seems an unlikely encounter - Groucho Marx and T.S. Eliot having dinner together.
The comic genius and the poet laureate were mutual admirers, corresponding for years before they did actually meet. Irish playwright Frank McGuinness creates a quixotically erudite explosion of ideas from the wildly re-imagined meeting.
Set in a mystical Limbo, huge themes collide: individual purpose and legacy are given whimsical and poetic voice through McGuinness’ free-associating word play. Echoes of Waiting for Godot abound.
At 70 minutes it's a compact blast of cerebral and physical theatre. Director Loveday Ingram gives the quicksilver dialogue a pacey production. The tweed-suited, high-minded Eliot and Bronx-loving, greasepaint-mustachioed Groucho riff on the esoteric and surreal – from why they are there, the purpose of life and their imminent extinction – to the banal but significant – whether duck soup really should be followed by a main course of steak.
Shakespeare, Beckett, Sartre litter the exchanges; musings on anti-Semitism, Yiddish, vaudeville ceaselessly chop and change. The play kicks off with a mesmerizing incantation by the brisk Proprietor (Ingrid Craigie) with lines that could come straight from one of Eliot’s poems, ‘Bones, rest quietly. Earth, lie lightly. But now - rise.’
But who is she? God? Or a scatty incarnation of music hall doyenne Marie Lloyd with her frequent renditions of ‘The Boy I love is up in the Gallery?’ And who are they – ghosts? Adam Wiltshire’s set is magical: a collection of light-filled orbs that glow then dim above a dainty bistro table that looks like it’s landed on the moon.
The writing is dense, at times the thematic associations confusing, but there’s no shortage of joyously absurdist lines as the two grapple with the impossible conundrum of existence intercut with interludes of zany Charleston and magic tricks.
Ian Batholomew's physical performance is much more than an imitation of the gleeful, cigar-smoking Groucho and brings out the proud ambition of an assimilated Jew who can’t quite escape his fear of rejection.
Greg Hicks is all British establishment charm s Eliot with a generous serving of simmering menace, often squinting, always beguiled by his incorrigible dinner-date. Eliot may have invited Groucho to join him, but it’s Groucho who leads in this melancholy dance.
Dinner With Groucho runs at Arcola Theatre, Hackney until December 10.https://www.arcolatheatre.com/whats-on/dinner-with-groucho/
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules here