'Flare Path' by Terence Rattigan directed by Trevor Nunn

What a master craftsman Rattigan was!  His stories flow past an audience seeingly effortlessly and it is only in retrospect that one realises with what care he constructs and melds the different scenes, first raising laughs, then raising tension which almost becomes unbearable before, at exactly the right moment, humour intrudes again.  The opening scene is relatively slow-moving because it is concerned mainly with introducing the characters but very soon, bit by bit, Rattigan draws back one veil after another to expose the hidden inner emotions and entanglements - and always, in the background to begin with but later bursting forth onto the stage via some tremendous special effects, are the threatening machinations of war.

This play was written in 1942 and is concerned with the aircrews from the RAF bomber station which lies adjacent to the country hotel/pub in which the play is set.  Rattigan served as an air gunner and had what they used to call, no doubt with usual British irony, 'a good war'!  He saw action, lots of it, and he wrote where-of he knew intimately.  His characters stay with you long, long after you have seen the play because they are so real, so ordinary, so like us.  He was criticised in some smart-arse corners for giving this play a sentimental ending but, for God's sake, this was performed when Britain was engaged in a terrible war which smashed and bashed and trashed people almost everywhere in the country.  Real-life tragedy of the most painful kind, not the stage variety, touched virtually everyone in those grim days and nights.  The people in the audience then needed, no, they deserved, an optimistic ending.

This was a good production and my guess is that once the London run ends the 'starry names' will depart to be replaced by others and the show will then tour the provinces.  If it comes on near you, I urge you to give it a try, it is a superb and moving three hours in the theatre.  I can pay it no higher compliment than to tell you that the grumpy, cynical, old git who runs this blog was reduced to gulping back tears on several occasions.

 

Comments

[dearieme]

Dear grumpy, cynical git, allow me to cheer you up.
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/05/9-of-the-best-recordings-from-the-library-of-congress-new-music-service/238749/

[David Duff]

Very many thanks, DM, feelin' better already!