The Goat, or Who is Sylvia? , a CurtainUp London review

CurtainUp

The Internet Theater Magazine of Reviews, Features, Annotated Listings

www.curtainup.com

HOME PAGE

>SEARCH

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

On TKTS

PLAYWRIGHTS' ALBUMS

LETTERS TO EDITOR

FILM

LINKS

MISCELLANEOUS
Free Updates
Masthead

Writing for Us

A CurtainUp London Review

The Goat or Who is Sylvia?

Brian Clover takes a second look at Edward Albee's The Goat or Who is Sylvia as it transfers to the Apollo Shaftesbury Avenue.

As my Curtain Up colleagues have already pointed out, there can by now be few theatre-goers who are unaware of the plot of The Goat. The piece has now transferred successfully to the Apollo, which is an apt venue given that Albee has used the form of a classical Greek tragedy and given it a twist. The Goat describes the downfall of a great man at the height of his power and does so by observing Aristotle's unities, while the plot hinges, absurdly, surreally, on that goat, a knowing allusion to the origin of the word "tragedy" itself, literally a "goat-song".

So at one level we have a sophisticated literary in-joke (and not the only one, since Albee also makes a sprightly passing reference to Arthur Kopit's Oh Dad Poor Dad…) and if this were all we might be in for a rather strained evening. But that would be to reckon without Albee's skill and a superlative cast that works exceptionally hard to convince us of the play's central premise.

As pre-eminent architect and clandestine goat-fancier Martin, Jonathan Pryce gives a monumental performance. On stage for most of the play's ninety minutes, Pryce's versatility ranges from middle-aged distraction through high-adrenalin verbal sparring to ultimate wailing despair. Kate Fahy's Stevie is a more than able partner, whether improvising sub-Noel Coward dialogue with her ideal husband or destroying her apartment as her life has been destroyed by the very same man. (Best not to sit in the front row with all that china skittering about.) But a woman always capable of classy repartee like "Women in deep woe often mix their metaphor." Matthew Marsh carries the less-rewarding role of treacherous best friend and pompous catalyst while Eddie Redmayne as confused son Billy is plainly a star in the making.

Albee's play proceeds through four set-piece dialogue duels, alternately brittle, edgy, devastating and tentative before reaching its explosive conclusion. His purpose seems to be to suggest that primitive violence lurks beneath civilised discourse while below this lies a deeper nihilism. "Nothing has anything to do with anything else," he repeats. But there are less felicitous repetitions in the text. In the second part Ross's letter is heard twice, as is the fateful encounter with Sylvia. The device of interruption is used to stretch out the narrative so much that with a less talented cast you might feel you were being treated to a shaggy goat story. But this evening is a success and the actors are treated to a well-deserved ovation.

You may recall the early Woody Allen with the Manhattan psychiatrist who falls in love with a Greek patient's sheep. (Gene Wilder in Everything You Wanted to Know About Sex, I think, though readers will correct me if I misremember.) "I know we come from different worlds," he tells his beloved in a sketch that is funny, poignant and brief. The Goat is its tragic counterpart, and every bit as uncomfortable as its author intended.

To read the first and second cast reviews of The Goat in New York, go here.

The Goat or Who is Sylvia?
Written by Edward Albee
Directed by Anthony Page

Starring: Jonathan Pryce
With: Kate Fahy, Matthew Marsh, Eddie Redmayne
Designer: Hildegarde Bechtler
Lighting Designer: Peter Mumford
Sound: Matthew Berry
Sponsored by Coutts and Aspen Re
Running time: One hour thirty minutes with no interval
Box Office: 0870 890 1101
Booking to 7th August 2004
Reviewed by Brian Clover on 19th April 2004 performance at the Apollo Shaftesbury Avenue, W1 (Tube: Piccadilly Circus)

--- Lizzie Loveridge's previous review

Ross: This is Sylvia who you are fucking?
Martin: Don't say that . . . . .whom.

Jonathan Pryce as Martin
(Photo: John Haynes)

As it has been almost two years in coming to London, there are very few members of the audience who do not know what Edward Albee's play The Goat, or Who is Sylvia? is superficially all about. Of course they are deceiving themselves if they think that they have come to see a play about a man whose mistress is a goat. The goat is simply a metaphor for behaviour that we find unacceptable in others, something beyond our own personal boundaries.

However Jonathan Pryce takes the part of the lovelorn architect Martin with such sympathy, that I was prepared to believe that he had really fallen for a goat. At first the audience were laughing, initially unwilling to accept this relationship as anything other than a comic, ridiculous vehicle. I identified, not with the betrayed wife (as might be expected), but with the man who is the victim of his own passionate nature. I am amazed that Albee makes it work so well. The madness that Martin knows will jeopardise his marriage, his career, his family, cannot be prevented. It is as implacable as any Greek tragedy.

Pryce as Martin starts off the play as if he is going senile, getting forgetful. His wife Stevie (Kate Fahy) is all tolerance and sympathy, sensing that he is having an affair. His acting is so state of the art that I started to question whether Jonathan Pryce had been ill. As the play gathers momentum and Pryce is lightened by the enforced confession, he is able to expand on his relationship with Sylvia --as occured to me in a lighter moment, " The love that dare not bleat its name."

Kate Fahy as Stevie starts the play in control but her reaction to the news is to destroy her home and throw around its expensive art works. (I loved the note in the programme from the real artists of the pots and painting saying that they had lent their work to the Almeida. Lent? In what state will they be returned? How many of those artefacts will they have to produce for the run of the play?) Stevie's destructiveness mirrors the helplessness of her situation. This articulate woman does not resort to violence in the normal course of events. The thought of making love to her husband just after or just before he has fucked the goat is mind blowing. Fahy has an intelligent ordinariness which is brilliantly cast here.

Matthew Marsh as Ross, Martin's so-called best friend is the metaphorical representative of the tabloids, those sections of the press that take the indignant, high moral ground but sell newspapers on the strength of the sordid quality of their exposées. Ross' role is interference and malice. Martin's complete lack of guile when he is interviewed is disarming. Ross is vulgar as the stereotypical red blooded male who enthusiastically condones Martin's extra marital affair until he discovers its unacceptable aspect. Interesting line drawing by Albee here. Eddie Redmayne as Martin and Stevie's son, Billy is more than a little distressed, much of the time in tears. It is pretty clear that his problems pre-date his father's affair with the silky coated Sylvia.

There are, as Elyse Sommer found, moments of pure absurdism. I enjoyed the description of the meeting of "Animal Fuckers Anonymous" and the bizarre tales of men with sheep's wool stuck in their zipper or women and German Shepherds. To digress, I remember someone on the radio who had accessed an internet site, purporting to be about sex with animals, only to find pictures of a man having relations with an oven ready duck. However these amusing moments pale when set next to the searing tragedy of inexorable passion and inevitable loss. In the confident hands of director Anthony Page, The Goat is a must see and though we are not very far into 2004 but I am pretty sure Pryce's performance will be nominated for a best actor award.

To read the first and second cast reviews of The Goat in New York, go here.

The Goat or Who is Sylvia?
Written by Edward Albee
Directed by Anthony Page

Starring: Jonathan Pryce
With: Kate Fahy, Matthew Marsh, Eddie Redmayne
Designer: Hildegarde Bechtler
Lighting Designer: Peter Mumford
Sound: Matthew Berry
Sponsored by Coutts and Aspen Re
Running time: One hour thirty minutes with no interval
Box Office: 020 7359 4404
Booking to 13th March 2004.
Reviewed by Lizzie Loveridge based on 4th February 2004 at the Almeida Theatre, Upper Street, London N1(Tube: Angel, Islington)