Monday 10 November 2014

The National Theatre's Frankenstein


I now know why Danny Bole was invited to direct the 2012 London Olympics opening ceremony.     Whoever did so had seen his production of Frankenstein at the National Theatre in 2011.    I had to wait over three years to see it being rebroadcast in a local cinema, (well, by local I mean 50 miles away).    Having seen it I checked out the team Boyle used for both, and saw that he worked with the same Set Designer, Mark Tildesley,   Costume Designer, Suttirat Anne Larlarb, and Director of Movement, Toby Sedgewick.      If you saw the Olympics you might have some idea how well they used the National Theatre’s resources and the  magnificent Laurence Olivier stage,  with its rising, falling, revolving  centre.   I saw the two episodes of Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials there  a few years ago, which was terrific – but this production was something else.    

And it  had Jonny Lee Miller and Benedict Cumberbatch on board.   Cumberbatch had  already played a ‘high achieving sociopath’  Sherlock Holmes in the 2010 BBC series.   At the National he played another ‘high achieving sociopath’, the driven genius Victor Frankenstein.  At least he played him on alternate nights,  as Miller and Cumberbatch swapped the roles of the scientist and his unloved creation.    This adaptation of Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel  was written by Nick Dear and broadcast live to cinemas in March 2011.   More than a quarter of a million people, in over thirty countries, saw the original cinematic event.   I think the delay in rebroadcasting it was due to a lack of agreement about which version to use; the one with Jonny Lee Miller as the Creature, or Benedict Cumberbatch.    Both actors had been praised in both roles, but for the rebroadcast it was Cumberbatch.    

He was a revelation .    I had hugely enjoyed his Sherlock,  been quietly surprised by his casting as Khan in Star Trek Into Darkness, and remembered him from a few earlier TV shows and films, but nothing had prepared me for his performance as the Creature.    First of all his physicality.   The long opening sequence shows the Creature learning how to move, crawl, stand and walk, how to wrest control of his new body.     Cumberbatch is almost naked, and his writhing, rising and falling reveal his remarkable physique.   His power does not come from massive muscles, but from spun steel cords.   And this was not simply an actor thrashing about in free form,  it seems plain that every contorting bruising, muscle stretching movement was choreographed by the actor and Toby Sedgewick.   Later in the play we see Cumberbatch’s  remarkable grace, agility and athleticism as he leaps, bounds, climbs, spins, gestures and wrestles with his creator.    At one point, a real coup de theatre, the Creature is hidden on stage, lying on his back, completely covered, until he leaps, springs, levitates into sight faster than any  Vertical Takeoff fighter plane.   No wonder the actors swapped roles; to perform this every night would have been exhausting.    

Jonny Lee Miller playing another modern Sherlock in the current American series,  has impressed me, and his  playing of Victor Frankenstein was impressive.    We clearly see who the real monster is,  and it is Victor’s  lack of humanity that monsterises his unloved creation.  But I can see why the actors vied for their embodiment of the creature to be the one broadcast.    The Creature, not Frankenstein, is the main event.   

The rest of the cast are simply very good; Karl Johnson is de Lacey, the impoverish – and blinded – professor who educates the creature, and Naomie Harris is Frankenstein’s ill-fated fiancĂ©, Elizabeth.  But the evening belongs to the two stars, Danny Boyle and the other directors.  

The script is sometimes a little bathetic, sometimes unintentionally funny, and sometimes it has lines I could only call banal, but no matter.   I have waited three years for this; and it was better than I could imagine.  But if I could have imagined such a production I would be Danny Boyle.   I am glad Danny Boyle is Danny Boyle, and that the National Theatre shares its riches with the world.