SITE GUIDE
REVIEWS
FEATURES
NEWS
Etcetera and
Short Term Listings
LISTINGS
Broadway
Off-Broadway
NYC Restaurants
BOOKS and CDs
OTHER PLACES
Berkshires
London
California
DC
Philadelphia
Elsewhere
QUOTES
TKTS
PLAYWRIGHTS' ALBUMS
LETTERS TO EDITOR
FILM
LINKS
MISCELLANEOUS
Free Updates
Masthead
Writing for Us
A CurtainUp Multiple Review
The History Boys
Editor's Update, January 6, 2007: This play has taken on multiple lives. Since our review of the Broadway transfer with its original London cast, it's been made into a film (also with the original cast). Now it's getting its first actual West End production and so, Lizzie Loveridge has gone back to visit it for the third time and her initial double review has turned into a triple-decker, starting with her first review and rounding things out with the West End review. Her Three Visits to The History Boys follows the Broadway Production review in the gray box below.
|
The History Boys On Broadway
by Elyse Sommer
The play, reviewed for CurtainUp when it premiered and also during another run with a different cast at the Lyttleton, has weathered the ocean crossing without the slightest damage. The setting, a grammar school in Northern England during the 1980s (the British equivalent of our public high schools school), may seem too insular to translate for American audiences but the education conundrum at its heart poses a question with universal meaning: Does the kind of education that gains students a place in a country's most prestigious universities come at a cost of never learning how to nurture the mind's garden for a fully realized life? If I had to single out the season's most intelligent, exhilarating evening of theater, Alan Bennett's idea and humor rich play would win hands down. The story about a group of young Brits for whom Oxbridge (a portmanteau name for Oxford and Cambridge) is the Holy Grail for a crème-de-la-crème career path doesn't pander to escape seeking audiences. Yes, it's highbrow, but it's also remarkably accessible. Yes, there's a scene completely in French, but even with my decidedly limited French, the script and the hilarious stage interpretation never left me feeling like an outsider trying to get an inside joke. By the same token, though it wouldn't hurt to have some familiarity with the poets mentioned, it doesn't really matter since their verses are so artfully and enjoyably interspersed into the dialogue. Given the play's stunning filmic staging (black and white film footage the school's everyday life and of Irwinas a television documentary narrator) and an influential eccentric teacher as central character, it's hardly surprising that this London hit (and surely a Broadway hit as well) has already been made into a film. After all, think of the successful Dead Poets Society and that old classroom heart-tugger, Goodbye Mr. Chips. But, unlike Chips, Mr. Hector and his boys are painted in decidedly darker, less sentimental brush strokes. The cast has had plenty of opportunity to bond, to enrich their performances and for minor players to step into major roles as needed (at the performance I attended Rudi Dharmalingam who usually plays one of the unnamed other boys, ably took over as Crowther, usually played by Samuel Anderson). Most have been with the play from its beginnings as a radio play, National Theater premiere, the making of the film and now in the Broadway transfer. Thus, if anything, they're even better than when Lizzie Loveridge saw them in London. I haven't a single quarrel with Lizzie's assessment of the play which also describes enough of the plot details and characters for me to conclude this assessment of the transfer with just a few personal comments. Griffith's performance is truly breathtaking, and I was struck by how the physical contrast between his Falstaffian proportions and the headmaster's (the exemplary Clive Merrison) trim figure in its always neat corporate attire accentuated the difference in their philosophies. Hector's philosophy is capsulized in his answer to the student who objects to having to memorize so much ("poetry difficult because "most of the stuff poetry's about hasn't happened to us yet "): "But it will Timms, It will. And then you have the antidote ready! Grief. Happiness. Even when you're dying. We're making your deathbeds here boys. Poetry is the trailer! Forthcoming attractions!" American audiences may be somewhat taken aback by the boys rather casual acceptance of Griffith's "fiddling" with them. However, it's all part of the tragi-comic portrait of the man. The boys' are all so finely individualized that it's impossible to pick a favorite. Even Rudge (RussellTovey), the class non-intellect is endearing and his definition of history as "one fuckin' thing after another " is certainly a definition likely to be borrowed by many. And surely any teenager who feels hopelessly different will identify with Posner's "I'm a Jew. I'm small. I'm homosexual. And I live in Sheffield. I'm fucked." I was tempted to rename the play's only female actress, Frances de la Tour as Frances de la tour-de-force. As the play's only female cast member she's elegant, smart, and delivers the lines with which Bennett has gifted her with deadpan precision. Her monologue in the second act's third scene is beyond priceless. There's also her wry observation that though she's "taught history on a strictly non-gender orientated basis" it seems to have occured to none of her students how dispiriting she finds it "to teach five centuries of masculine ineptitude." I could go on citing favorite scenes and passages, but it all adds up to the same thing: This is a history lesson which will pass any test for a first-rate, stick-to-the-mind theatrical experience. Caveat: There will be no late seating during the first 10 minutes of the performance. All latecomers will be seated during appropriate intervals as determined by management -- a practice I wish more theaters would follow, though late arrivals are disturbing at any time and the only right time to arrive is before the curtain rises. BROADWAY PRODUCTION NOTES The History Boys by Alan Bennett Directed by Nicholas Hytner; Cast: Sacha Dhawan (Akthar), Rudi Dharmalingam (Crowther), Dominic Cooper (Dakin), Andrew Knott (Lockwood), Samuel Barnett (Posner), Russell Tovey (Rudge), Jamie Parker (Scripps), James Corden (Timms), Clive Merrison (Headmaster), Frances de la Tour (Mrs. Lintott), Richard Griffiths (Hector), Stephen Campbell Moore (Irwin), Colin Haigh (TV Director) and Pamela Merrick (Makeup Lady). Joseph Attenborough, Tom Atwood, Rudi Dharmalingham (Other Boys). Designer: Bob Crowley Lighting Design: Mark Henderson Sound Design: Colin Pink Music: Richard Sisson Video Director: Ben Taylor The National Theater of Great Britain production presented by Boyett Ostar Productions, Roger Berlind, Debra Black, Eric Falkenstein, Roy Furman, Jam Theatricals, Stephanie P. McClelland, Judith Resnick, Scott Rudin, Jon Avnet/Ralph Guild and Dede Harris/Mort Swinsky at the Broadhurst Theater, 235 West 44th Street, (212) 239-6200. From 4/14/06 to 9/20/06--extended to 10/01/06; opening 4/23/06. Running time: 2 hours 45 minutes, includes one intermission Tuesday through Saturday at 8 PM, Wednesday and Saturday at 2 PM, Sunday at 3 PM Tickets: $96.25 to $46.25 To be reviewed by Elyse Sommer based on April 26th performance |
Three Visits to The History Boys by Lizzie Loveridge
| The chief enemy of culture in any school is the headmaster --- Mrs Lintott |
Jamie Parker as Scripps, Richard Griffiths as Hector, Andrew Knott as Lockwood, Dominic Cooper as Dakin and James Corden as Timms
(Photo: Ivan Kyncl) |
A central theme of Bennett's play is the purpose of education. Is it to pass exams or is it to encourage a desire for learning? Bennett's gentle wit means his points are made effectively but there is plenty to smile at in his plays, they are very pleasurable. Bennett's work is less obviously intellectual than Stoppard's, but his plays have that delightful, dry Yorkshire humorous ability to winkle out and expose the ridiculous in ordinary situations. Bennett's secondary theme is more contentious: dealing with the relationship between pedagogy and pederasty in this all boys school.
The play opens with a flashback. One of today's breed of television presenter historians, Irwin (Stephen Campbell Moore), now in a wheelchair, recalls his time as a teacher in a Northern grammar school in the 1980s. Irwin has been recruited by the Headmaster (Clive Merrison) to nurture a group of boys with a view to Oxbridge Entrance. These boys have an unorthodox teacher of General Studies, Hector, who takes a broader view of his teaching role than the headmaster would like. These boys are clever, witty, attractive. Dakin (Dominic Cooper) is the leader and most sought after of the group. Posner (Samuel Barnett) is artistic, musically talented and gay. Rudge (Russell Tovey) is the odd one out, a brilliant sportsman but less gifted intellectually.
A French lesson is interrupted by the Headmaster, showing the new member of staff round the school, but in this instance the boys are practising their French by pretending to be client and whores in a Parisian brothel. Some quick thinking, helped by the Headmaster's ineptitude at the French language, results in the scene interpretation shifting quickly to an army hospital in Ypres in the First World War. How else to explain one boy's separation from his trousers?
Although the play is mostly set in the 1980s there are details from the future. A reference to league tables, an invention of the 1990s, to measure school performance motivates the Headmaster. Staffroom conversations between Mrs Lintott (Frances de la Tour) and Hector or Irwin show the widening gulf between the politics of educational measurement and teaching as a vocation. The head, whose self serving stupidity is the butt for much of Bennett's humour, says at one point, "I know he's inspirational but how do I quantify inspiration?" He is the inheritor of Oscar Wilde's comment about those that know "the price of everything and the value of nothing". When Rudge wins his place at Oxford and the assumption is that his sporting ability has swung the place, we are told not so but that it is his relative being a college servant which decides. This is Bennett's way of introducing the struggle by Oxbridge colleges to appear more democratic in their selection process by taking fewer from private schools and privileged backgrounds. The television historian scenes are also dazzling, Bennett plays with us as Irwin says with a straight face that, "The loss of liberty is the price we pay for freedom" and that "Archaeology is the closest history comes to shopping".
The performances from all are nothing short of wonderful. Dominic Cooper is maturing into an excellent actor but he is still able to convince, playing characters seven or eight years younger than his chronological age. Samuel Barnett, too as the sensitive Posner, who sings outstandingly, and for whom the discovery of his sexuality impacts on his young life. Richard Griffiths is a gargantuan figure; he conveys a delicacy of purpose as the motor bike riding teacher, unconventional and the kind of teacher whose lessons every pupil will remember for a lifetime. Frances de la Tour is well cast as the observer, the female teacher in this all male environment, sardonic, perceptive, witty. Stephen Campbell Moore as Irwin, who is only a little older than the boys has the reticence of a new teacher. He is somewhat overawed by Hector, but it is through his voice that the narrative takes shape. Aside, an ongoing competition between the boys and Hector to win a pot of money by replaying famous clips from film of the 1940s and 1950s gives Bennett the opportunity to have some of the boys delightfully recreating scenes from classic films such as Brief Encounter. Hector of course knows not only the title, the year, but also the stars, the director, the screenwriter of them all.
In between scenes in the school, black and white film is used of the boys in everyday situations giving a good feel for the historical period. The conventional school sets, Hector's film poster filled classroom, the sterile grey of the staff room, are dominated by a ceiling full of rows of overhanging lights like desks in a schoolroom. The direction is so good, the writing so natural, that I believed completely in Bennett's characters, I wasn't watching a play but real teachers and pupils. I can see no reason why The History Boys should not transfer to a long and successful West End run.
PRODUCTION NOTES
The History Boys
Written by Alan Bennett
Directed by Nicholas Hytner
Starring: Richard Griffiths, Frances de la Tour, Stephen Campbell Moore
With: Sacha Dhawan, Samuel Anderson, Dominic Cooper, Andrew Knott, Samuel Barnett, Russell Tovey, Jamie Parker, James Corden, Clive Merrison
Designer: Bob Crowley
Lighting Designer: Mark Henderson
Sound: Colin Pink
Music: Richard Sisson
Running time: Two hours fifty minutes with one interval
Box Office: 020 7452 3000
Booking to 2nd September 2004.
Reviewed by Lizzie Loveridge based on 26th May 2004 performance at the Lyttelton, Royal National Theatre
The History Boys Second Time Around
Thomas Morrison as Scripps, Jamie King as Dakin and Steven Webb as Posner
(Photo: Manuel Harlan) |
Prior to its opening in New York next year, the touring production of Alan Bennett's play, The History Boys is returning to the Lyttelton at the National Theatre where it is running through 1st of February with a different cast from the one which opened the play last year. As Richard Griffiths is currently in Heroes at the Wyndhams, Des Barritt takes over the main role of Hector, the inspirational teacher with a sexual agenda. I was pleasantly surprised to see that Des Barritt is as likeable as Richard Griffiths was in the part because the play depends on our having some sympathy for Hector. Diane Fletcher very ably takes over Mrs Lintott's role and Tobias Menzies plays a more vulnerable Irwin, the teacher brought in to coach the boys for Oxbridge entrance. Jamie King is excellent as Dakin, certainly as good as Dominic Cooper, and Steven Webb as Posner is more openly camp than the first boy in the part, Samuel Barnett. Thomas Morrison struck me as the young Bennett
The play altered little for me on second viewing; I enjoyed it just as much. However it is almost half an hour shorter but I think the cuts do not materially affect the play. For instance the boys only play one film clip for Horace to guess rather than two, there is only one boy put through his Oxford interview paces rather than two. I reflected on Irwin's mission with the boys for them to stand out in the Oxford and Cambridge examination with a slightly different view of history from the conventional. I wondered if Alan Bennett was applying this by trying to let us see the man behind the sexual offender, a different take on paedophilia. Is Horace a monster abusing his position with children or are 17 to 18 year olds knowing and willing? The debate on these issues will continue.
The History Boys Moves to the West End and Lizzie Loveridge Visits it a Third Time
The National Theatre's acclaimed and award winning production of Alan Bennett's The History Boys has moved into the Wyndham's for its first run in the West End proper. The principal roles of the school teachers are recast but three of the boys reprise their UK touring original roles, Thomas Morrison as Scripps, Steven Webb as Posner and Marc Elliott as Akthar.
The play is set to become a modern classic although on the third viewing I am still no clearer as to whether it is set in the league table driven 1980s, the 1950s when Bennett himself and his sixth form generation were striving for Oxbridge entrance, the 1970s when it seems some of the play's references allude to, or indeed the 1990s when Oxford and Cambridge became aware of their elitist image and the need to accept students, like Rudge, from poorer educational backgrounds. Irwin's subsequent career as a television historian and later as a political adviser place the previous events at the school in the late 1980s and the programme states that the action takes place in a Grammar School in the North in the 1980s, although we know that most of these selective Grammar Schools became Comprehensives by the mid 1970s.
I was struck this time by three approaches to education, Mrs Lintott's (Isla Blair) solid foundation teaching the facts and Hector's (Stephen Moore) wider interpretation of knowledge as distinct from education needed for examination success. Then there is Irwin's meretricious manipulation of an accepted premise in order to impress the dons and stand out as an original thinker and worthy of a university place. Bennett writes in the theatre programme about how he himself played this game in order to secure a scholarship at Oxford and he makes it clear he does not think it was clever or honest.
Stephen Moore is less charismatic as Hector, more believable in some ways as the man saddened and limited by his choice of career. He is more elegiac than flamboyant and inspirational. Isla Blair is softer as Mrs Lintott and we see her warmth in a filmed lesson with younger boys putting up their hands to answer her questions. The headmaster's role, played by William Chubb, is as self serving as ever. Ben Barnes as Dakin seems more expedient as he experiments and manipulates Irwin. Orlando Wells is excellent as the geeky and underconfident Irwin who has lied to secure his job and who contrasts nicely with his obvious command in his later employment.
The staging at Wyndham's is very similar to the Lytellton, the National's proscenium arched stage, and of course we realise that each new casting requires a different black and white film to be made to show between scenes which contributes to an authentic school atmosphere. The scenes where the boys recreate the Parisian brothel which rapidly has to segue into a First World War battlefield hospital or when they replay scenes from classic films are examples of the very best stage comedy. Now I need to see the filmed version of The History Boys to compare its long term impact.
|
THE HISTORY BOYS
Written by Alan Bennett Directed by Nicholas Hytner Recreated by Simon Cox Starring: Stephen Moore, Isla Blair, William Chubb and Orlando Wells With: Owain Arthur, Ben Barnes, Philip Correia, Marc Elliott, Thomas Morrison, Akemnji Ndifornyen, David Poynor, Steven Webb Design: Bob Crowley Video Director: Ben Taylor Lighting: Mark Henderson Sound: Colin Pink Music: Richard Sisson Running time: Two hours 45 minutes with no interval Box Office: 0870 950 0925 Booking to 14th April 2007 Reviewed by Lizzie Loveridge based on 3rd January 2007 performance at the Wyndham's Theatre, Charing Cross Road, london WC2 (Tube: Leicester Square) |
Easy-on-the budget super gift for yourself and your musical loving friends. Tons of gorgeous pictures.
Leonard Maltin's 2007 Movie Guide
At This Theater
Leonard Maltin's 2005 Movie Guide
>
