Timeless script, great acting, superb direction, for once a lengthy play that truly deserves a West End transfer.
Theatre shows take a lot of liberties in their length. Audiences are routinely asked to sit through well over two and a half hours of set changes, character arcs and frustrating “nuances” that are rarely justified. Mike Leigh's Ecstasy at Duchess Theatre runs at nearly three hours, and all of it feels essential.
We meet Jean in a '70s Kilburn bedsit. She's naked in bed, and a man sits in her room. We don't leave the bedsit until the very end and when we do, Jean is naked in bed after a night of drama, drink and hilarity with three friends, and a man sits in her room. What takes us from such a quiet, stifled beginning to what turns out to be a sad but warm end is moving, funny and a little tragic. There's no happy ending here but Leigh leaves us with that feeling of satisfaction you get when a raucous belly laugh quietens and things don't seem so bad after all.
It's easy to find his characters frustrating at first. Jean makes herself seem like a loveable goon as she allows a man she doesn't like to pour her drinks, make her smoke and generally be a selfish brute at her expense. But as I leave the theatre, her voice is still ringing in my head and I'm so glad Leigh lets us get to know her. Along with long-term friend Dawn, Dawn's husband Mick and a fourth old friend in lovelorn Len, they reminisce, sing and talk shoplifting, blackies, pakis and loneliness.
Leigh's script is still captivating and impressively natural. The points he raise still mean something today. The laughs he gets are down to his characters, who somehow manage to have just the right amount of hyperbole without becoming, as it were, larger than life. Quiet at the beginning, clamorous and unrestrained in the middle and then touchingly soft again at the end, there's a satisfying structure to Ecstasy.
The cast are no doubt honoured to be working with the man responsible for Goose-Pimples and Secrets and Lies, but Leigh is also fortunate to have such a talented cast under his direction. The original production starred Julie Walters and Jim Broadbent and we could well be witnessing the next generation of actors to follow in their footsteps. Craig Parkinson's quiet everyman Len is the the anchor for Allen Leech's cheeky Irishman. Leech makes a perfect partner for sweetly brazen Dawn (the astute Sinead Matthews) who is a hilarious drunk and unwavering friend to solitary Jean. Leigh's rehearsal process confirms him as an actors' director and Sian Brooke must be feeling the benefits, so spot on is her performance.
Amazingly, I hardly felt two hours and fifty minutes pass by. This is testament to Leigh's respect for his audience, and that rare thing that is a justifiably lengthy play.
Ecstasy runs at Duchess Theatre until 28th May.
Image: John Haynes
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