'I'm either a stooge or a somnabulist – which is it?' So asks George Harvey Bone (Matthew Flynn), a tortured alcoholic obsessed with Netta (Caroline Faber and Clare Calbraith), a desperate actress hardened by ambition. Is George in thrall to a ruthless bitch whose unrelenting cruelty would provoke murderous thoughts in the mildest of men? Or is this version – and Netta - only seen through the skewed double-vision of a drink-addled fantasist? Is this a good honest man brought down by a nasty prick-tease, or a troubled man projecting his nightmares onto a blameless idealised woman?

Two actresses portray Netta, alternating between playing the actual character and an imagined 'double', a device that creates an interesting split focus, with the double serving as an extension of Bone's thoughts. The two Nettas represent the real and the imagined, and Bone grapples with this accomplice of his mind as she goads and encourages him to murder the ungrateful 'real' object of his love. It is a clever construct that takes a minute or two to grasp, but which yields tremendous visual and psychological scope.

The basic story is straightforward, though the presentation is more complex and the better for it. Bone pursues Netta doggedly, taking her out for meals, and paying for boozy trips to Brighton and is repaid only by contempt from Netta and her friends Peter (Gyuri Sarossy) and SYM. (Anthony Eden). Netta is only interested in mixing with people who can help boost her career, such as Eddie Carstairs (Jonathan Kemp) of Carstairs, Fitzgerald & Scott theatrical agency. She shows interest in Bone's old school friend Johnnie Littlejohn (Jamie De Courcey), who is an accountant with the agency, in the hope of getting closer to Eddie, and manipulates Bone into paying for a trip to Brighton to see a new show starring comedy duo Drexel & Hobbs (Gyuri Sarossy and Anthony Eden) with which the agency is involved. Netta contrives to ensure Bone does not attend the opening so that she is free to seduce Eddie. A paranoid Bone suspects that Netta and Johnnie Littlejohn are having an affair, and secretly follows her to Brighton to catch them out. Johnnie happens to spot Bone drinking himself into oblivion on the beach and convinces him that no one, not even Eddie, is interested in the rude, scheming actress, something Eddie later confirms. Murder ensues and Bone flees to Maidenhead where he runs out of money and places to hide, realising that he was (unsurprisingly) wrong about Maidenhead being the haven he had imagined and accepting that he 'might be wrong about everything'.

Along with a moody and elegant set, evocative music and sound, and ingenious stage direction, this superb seven-strong ensemble cast creates a seamless flow of psychological intrigue. The story's light and shade is etched with subtlety, shifting in tone as expertly as the rippling lighting states in which the stage is bathed from humorous to sinister, poetic to banal, and glamorous to wretched.

Clare Calbraith is a lively Netta, suitably haughty and arrogant as the self-centred actress, and mischievous as the Netta of Bone's distorted mind. Bone likens Netta to a prostitute, wishing 'she was something you could buy, and have, and be rid of', and Clare Calbraith's interpretation evokes a certain feline wantonness as she toys with him like a cat taunting a dying bird. Playing Bone's chum Johnnie Littlejohn, the agency accountant, Jamie De Courcey is endearingly straight-laced, and allows a touching sensitivity to peep through the cracks of the character's English reserve. Anthony Eden is excellent as SYM. the raucous friend of Netta, and as Hobbs in the comedy double-act Drexel and Hobbs, in which both actors demonstrate flawless comic timing and a deftness for slapstick. If Caroline Faber's voice were a person, it would recline on a chaise longue, wear a crushed velvet gown, sip Baileys and eat Cadbury's Caramel all day long. It's an incredibly sexy and nuanced voice, which she uses to great effect in lending depth to the role of Netta. This just about rescues the character from appearing so callous that people may not care what happens to her. Both she and Claire Calbraith display a marvellous physical command – slinky, precise, economical - and are a joy to watch. Matthew Flynn gives a fine performance as the gullible, passive, yet murderous George Harvey Bone. His Bone shows a sallow, hollow-eyed yearning for a quiet, cosy life with Netta, perhaps on a chicken farm in Surrey, with a strange obsession with Maidenhead - as if it were an antidote to the excesses of Earl's Court, where he lives. Bone's attempts to woo Netta are too callow to have any chance of success, and though her treatment of him is harsh, it is clear that he wouldn't settle for kindness, even if he got it - and she knows this. Bone's careening sanity eventually capsizes, after swaying between inebriated poetic invocations to his muse and plotting how to effect her demise, and plummets beyond the point of no return. Matthew Flynn delivers this journey with gut-churning believability, and Bone's assurances that 'it's all right, don't be frightened, don't bother' while he kills are delivered in the chilling, vacant intonations of a psychopath. Playing Bone's perceived rival for Netta's affections, Eddie Carstairs, Jonathan Kemp is enjoyably suave, with his smooth delivery and rich bass tones. Eddie is scathing about Netta when Johnnie brings Bone to see him after the Brighton show opening. His words of advice to 'throw a woman out of the window' if she behaves like that gives Bone just the misguided courage he needs to kill, as if he were putting down an unmanageable pet better off dead. Louche, cruel and looking like a young, blonde version of Sir Oswald Moseley, Peter is expertly performed by Gyuri Sarossy who also doubles as Drexel in the comedy duo Drexel & Hobbs. Sporting a clipped moustache, greased hair and a leer, he depicts Peter as a merciless bully, contrasting with his role as Drexel in which he plays the exuberant successful performer who brings his punch-lines into the bar after the show.

Swoop Productions' interpretation of Patrick Hamilton's 1941 novel, adapted for stage with panache by Fidelis Morgan, succeeds in conjuring up a swirling, film-noir-like tale of unrequited love, paranoia and obsession, enveloped by the suffocating presence of pre-war Fascism. Neville Chamberlain's 1938 speech on the Munich agreement, predicting 'peace for our time', reverberates throughout, making it more than a simple story of boy-loves-girl-but-girl-hates-boy. It concerns self-deception, self-interest, and appeasement arising from a failure to connect humanly, both at a macro level as 'Adolf and Mussolini and Neville' cavort at 'some sort of super-fascist wedding', and at the micro level of Bone and Netta. In both contexts, events are beset with naivety, cowardly promises, exploitation and betrayal.

Director Gemma Fairlie executes Fidelis Morgan's adaptation brilliantly, using this ensemble's talent with maximum effect. She draws strong performances from the ever-present cast, which also contributes a sound-scape of live and recorded whispered lines from the play between scenes. Her direction of the interplay of the two Nettas is never clumsy and is especially entertaining in the scene where Bone, who occasionally talks to his invisible cat, Pussy, makes a phone call to Netta and they nuzzle either side of him emitting a cute 'purr-purr' telephone ring in a crescendo as he anticipates Netta's answer with mounting excitement. Gorgeous. Alex Marker's impressive noir-themed set comprises an old lamp post aglow in swirling dry-ice, a Classical-Greek-style portico with grey columns against which Bone leans drunkenly, and a series of black-and-white photographs, each of a woman's ear, eye, nose, hand or some other feature touched up with red for fingernails or lips – perhaps indicating the compartmentalisation and dehumanisation of obsession. Trevor Wallace's rippling, shifting, shadowy lighting design works in harmony with the set whilst Steve Mayo's use of sweeping string melodies and 1940s wireless music does everything to enhance atmosphere. Penn O'Gara's well-chosen and made costumes are simple and accurate for the period, and high praise is due to movement director Anna Morrissey for the play's stylish choreography and well-executed movement, replete with emotional charge and thoroughly integral to the action. Credit goes to Janine Snape for faultless casting and to stage manager Eleanor Waugh and producer Sean Duffy for a well-made, coherent production.

If there's a difficulty with the piece, it is that it's hard to care enough about a spineless wimp who kills an unpleasant woman because he can't have her. To be interested in the 'moth drawn to a flame' story, surely the moth must be at least a little brave, and the flame a little likeable before it extinguishes the two of them. However, this is a minor quibble, and this production of Hangover Square by Swoop Productions, The Earls Court Festival 2008 and Neil McPherson is immensely watchable and superbly acted.

Cast Credits: (alpha order): Clare Calbraith - Netta, Receptionist, Girl. Jamie De Courcey - Johnnie LittleJohn, Night Porter. Antony Eden - SYM, Hobbs, Waiter. Caroline Faber - Netta, Woman's Voice, Lady, Girl, Mrs Chope. Matthew Flynn - George Harvey Bone. Jonathan Kemp - Eddie Carstairs, Train Porter, Man. Gyuri Sarossy - Peter, Barman, Drexel.

Company Credits: Novel - Patrick Hamilton. Stage Adaptation - Fidelis Morgan. Director - Gemma Fairlie. Set Design - Alex Marker. Lighting - Trevor Wallace. Sound - Steve Mayo. Costume Design - Penn O'Gara. Movement Director - Anna Morrissey. Casting - Janine Snape CDG. Stage Manager - Eleanor Waugh. Producer - Sean Duffy. Company - Swoop Productions, The Earls Court Festival 2008, Neil McPherson.

Thanks to: Jennifer MacDonald. The Patrick Hamilton Estate. Paul Taylor. Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith. Sophie Woolley. Melanie Jessop. Briony Redman. Anthony Neilson. Richard Katz. Ed Collier. Craig and Rachel at the Royal Shakespeare Company. Guy Chapman. Celia Imrie. Dudley Sutton. High Street Kensington. Miriam Nelken and Stephen Evans at the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. The Questors Theatre, Ealing. Will Rutherford. Ashley Howington. Mike Hagan. Remi Smith. Fionntau Kersey. Chris Newall. Keith Clancy. Sharon McClure. Noni Beasley. Malcolm Connell. Jennifer Ware. Toby Brown. Nicholas Woollven. Rev David Walsh. David Griffiths. Diana Parnell. Sue Malcolm. Ronny Tenschert. Rev Tom Gillum. Barney Palfrey.

END

(c) Tara Paulsson 2008

reviewed Friday 11 July 08 / Finborough Theatre

Fringe Report (c) Fringe Report 2002-2012

www.fringereport.com