Review: Arcadia - at the Festival Theatre, Malvern from Tuesday, April 6 to Saturday, April 12, 2015.

WHEN I joined the 6th Form of my provincial grammar school in the early 1960’s, I had to choose either the Arts or the Science Department. There was no chance whatsoever of taking subjects across the two. You were either ‘Arts’ or ‘Science’, and the two disciplines were considered totally separate from each other.

Tom Stoppard’s challenging, witty, humorous and intricately staged play proves the lie to this orthodoxy, for in Arcadia he shows us the beauty and pattern of Mathematics and the power of Science to awe and disturb our conceptions of truth, time and history.

The English Touring Theatre’s production played to a large, engaged audience at Malvern Forum Theatre last week. Comedy was immediately to the fore, ensuring the relaxed atmosphere so essential for the enjoyment of Stoppard’s drama.

It is never easy to follow the twists and turns of his plot and characterisation. In Arcadia, the complications mainly arise from the inter-twining of action from two sets of characters living in the same country house, separated in time by 200 years.

Blanche McIntyre’s direction allowed the constant flow of scenes from one period to another without pause, but so seamlessly that each was built on the preceding action, commenting upon, and illuminating, what was to follow.

In the early 1800’s, Thomasina, a mathematics prodigy, is being tutored by Septimus Forge, who has invited his close friend and confidant, none other than the infamous Lord Byron (never seen), to join him at his pupil’s home. Septimus becomes embroiled in scandal as he is caught in the ‘carnal embrace’ of another guest’s wife and challenged to a duel as a result.

As the scene shifts to the present day, we are introduced to Hannah, who is researching the history of the house and its garden, and Valentine, who is gathering data from the records of Grouse Hunts there to develop a mathematical theory of population growth. Into their midst, arrives an academic, Bernard Nightingale, who from the records provided by Hannah, proposes what becomes to him the apparent truth that Lord Byron was the one involved in the duel which led to the death of the wronged husband.

You get the picture. As the action of these entirely implausible yet completely logical stories unwind, we are treated to typically Stoppardian discourse upon ‘chaos theory’ and ‘Darwinian Determinism’. Yet there is tenderness and romanticism too, as we see Thomasina develop ground-breaking theories while still retaining the naivety of a young adolescent girl.

The English Touring Theatre is to be congratulated on its policy of introducing young actors to classic theatre, often in their first professional roles. Ed MacArthur is to be specially commended on his portrayal of Valentine who expounded with clarity and passion the power of ‘iterated algorithms’ as revealed in the beauty and pattern of nature.

Dakota Blue Edwards, too, played Thomasina with just the right mixture of precociousness and humour. Her scenes with Septimus (Wilf Scolding) were played with a subtle and touching blend of dignity, love and mutual awareness. Robert Cavanah clearly had a ball as the arrogant, yet buffoonish academic, especially with the rendition of the speech he had prepared to reveal his misguided theory. Flora Montgomery played Hannah with clarity and energy, retaining for herself the one line that reveals Stoppard’s commentary on human existence - ‘It’s wanting to know that makes us matter’.

I have two criticisms of the play. It is half-an-hour too long. After two hours of making my brain work so hard to understand what is going on, and what new mathematical or philosophical theories are being propounded, my mind hurts. After two and a half hours, I simply can’t take anymore.

Secondly, the staging, dominated as it is by the large dining table which remains in place throughout, is too restrictive. Director Blanche McIntyre has most of the action going on behind the table, or characters are sat one end from the other, creating a feeling of distance; all sense of intimacy is lost.

Only at the end, in the most successful scene of the play, when the closeness between Thomasina and Septimus as student and tutor is threatened and disturbed by her developing sexuality, do the characters move to the front, and the audience begins to share the pathos and tenderness of their relationship.

Following the very generous final applause, as the audience left the auditorium, there was a level of engaged conversation such that I have never before experienced in Malvern. I overheard discussions on the nature of chaos theory, as well as on the mathematics of patterns in nature.

Some were heard to say they had understood little of what was going on, but that I suppose is what Stoppard’s play are all about. Whatever happens, they make you think; even if it hurts.

BB