Christopher Walker reviews Here in America
The fabulous Orange Tree Theatre always showcases the most interesting work. I particularly like its dedication to reviving neglected classics.
So, we can forgive them for taking on the odd new play, like David Edgar’s Here in America.
The play continues a recent trend to dig up the McCarthy purges of the 1950s, when the corrupt and deranged senator McCarthy encouraged a blacklisting of communists.
In some ways McCarthyism was the mirror image of the paranoia which swept through Stalin’s Russia. Though it has to be said the purges in the Soviet Union involved people not just being sacked but also being shot.
Some of these artistic excavations are successful. Fellow Travellers explored the purges in political circles, and the hundreds who were ousted not for communism but for being gay.
Others less so. In the recent mega-movie Oppenheimer, the very exciting story of the first atom bomb was largely overshadowed by tedious scenes of McCarthyite committee meetings.
Here in America explores the relationship between the playwright Arthur Miller (Michael Aloni), and the film Director Elia Kazan (Shaun Evans). Both dabbled with communism, and both were caught up in the purges.
Elia, egged on by his wife Molly (the wonderful Faye Castelow) was apparently quick to rat on friends. Miller held true.
It’s always hard to recreate recent historical figures and I found myself taking to YouTube – was Arthur Miller really like that? This is further compounded by Marilyn Munroe’s presence (Jasmine Blackborow). She was married to Miller and David Edgar tries to claim her as a fellow traveller, something the FBI found not to be true.
Edgar is a Corbynite, and so is keen to lionise martyrs of the left. But it is hard to feel a lot of sympathy for any of these characters who led very charmed lives.
And attempts to draw comparisons between the America of McCarthy and that of Trump today are surely stretched. Unless Edgar is trying to poke fun at the way Hollywood purges Trumpists, but I think that unlikely.
To book tickets go to – https://orangetreetheatre.co.uk/whats-on/here-in-america/
Pictured top: Jasmine Blackorow (Miss Bauer) and Michael Aloni (Art) (Picture: Manuel Harlan)