GEORGINA BROWN reviews Charlotte And Theodore

Peppery portrait of a modern marriage: GEORGINA BROWN reviews Charlotte And Theodore

Charlotte And Theodore (Ustinov Studio, Bath)

Rating:

Verdict: A battle for power

Days after the word ‘fat’ was cut from Roald Dahl’s children’s books, a play opens in which a philosophy professor calls a woman’s thinking ‘fat-headed’ and ‘intellectually crippled’ and is told to attend awareness-courses on gender, obesity and disability. Or get out. Which is fair enough.

Kris Marshall’s likeably clumsy Teddy doubtless knew that his failure to ‘genuflect at the new orthodoxy’ would risk cancellation, but he’s been rattled by the promotion — over his pale, male, stale head — of his whip-smart wife, Lotty (excellent Eve Ponsonby as a smooth operator) to become Head of Faculty.

Ryan Craig’s peppery portrait of a modern marriage is hot on the topics of freedom of speech, gender politics and power play. 

Halfway through Terry Johnson’s punchy production, which has the audience’s sympathies swinging, husband and wife have swapped places on either side of the prof’s desk. Teddy looks lost as he waits for Lotty to acknowledge him.

The taut two-hander begins at the end with Lotty handing him two ‘Hello Kitty’ toothbrushes for the kids as she leaves for a new job in the States. They moved on from Hello Kitty ages ago, says Teddy. 

Kris Marshall’s likeably clumsy Teddy doubtless knew that his failure to ‘genuflect at the new orthodoxy’ would risk cancellation but he’s been rattled by the promotion of his whip-smart wife, Lotty (Eve Ponsonby)

Days after the word ‘fat’ was cut from Roald Dahl’s children’s books, a play opens in which a philosophy professor calls a woman’s thinking ‘fat-headed’ and ‘intellectually crippled’

Furthermore, their daughter thinks her mother is a thief for stealing Daddy’s job. No, she retaliates, he’s an ‘abject failure’. Ouch.

In the meantime Craig rewinds to their first frisky, feisty encounter. And, on reflection, might it have been Lotty’s flattering suggestion that Teddy has the ‘potential for greatness’ that clinched her job?

As the years progress, Lotty slips into sleeker suits, higher heels and effortless genuflects at the new orthodoxy, while Teddy, tellingly, lumbers on just as he always has.

Between scenes, bursts of Bach’s Goldberg Variations powerfully underline the ideas of point and counterpoint.

Schematic but stirring stuff.

Until March 18. After Bath, the show moves to Richmond Theatre (March 21-25).

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