Jack Absolute Flies Again

“Jack Absolute Flies Again” is a recent reworking of Sheridan’s “The Rivals”, and while it draws substantially on this work and its dramatis personae, the web of influences extends much further.  The scheming, message-carrying maid is straight out of a Shakespearean comedy; the network of romantic relationships, real or mistaken, could form the basis of a Whitehall farce; and the Battle of Britain setting evokes “Blackadder IV” in that elements of tragedy and comedy are brought together in an intimate setting in the midst of a global conflict.  There’s a lot going on, and the play could easily become eleven characters in search of an identity, but the director’s great achievement was to blend the rich assortment of ingredients into a satisfying production.  There was wordplay and romance, pathos and farce, love, death and bunting everywhere …the running time may have been over three hours including the interval but the production was so pacy and engaging that the time simply flew by.

The ensemble work was very strong; everybody knew their lines really well and cues were hit smartly, to the extent that the audience was sometimes almost left behind trying to process the malapropisms.  And the cast did pause for breath now and then, particularly when the farcical humour gave way to moments of reflection on the brutality of war.  The adult themes and language in the script were delivered without hesitation or apparent embarrassment, and the occasional asides to the audience were differentiated from the onstage action without melodrama.  Body language was also very good; there were few if any instances of excessive gesturing, the scale of the acting was in keeping with the venue, and sight lines were invariably respected.  The staging of the occasional moment of intimacy, generally a horizontal snog, was appropriately tongue in cheek, if that’s the phrase I’m looking for; enthusiastic enough to be meaningful, but exaggerated enough to be mildly farcical.  Above all there was a real impression of community within the company, a sense of a disparate group of people forced together in dangerous days; I suspect that some of the director’s rehearsal drills, such as run-throughs at pace or with exaggerated emphasis, may have contributed to this sense of ensemble. 

The staging was imaginative and inventive, with traditional flats and elaborately constructed rooms eschewed in favour of some flexible furniture and isolated features.  The wooden door on its small truck formed the basis of some knockabout humour, and the physical comedy had been meticulously rehearsed.  Blackboards took the place of walls while doubling up as the medium for information such as the location of a scene, and items of furniture such as the mess table and dormitory beds were shifted around to suit a variety of settings.  Critically, all the pieces had been fitted with castors so everything could be rearranged with minimal effort, and the cast frequently assisted with the scene changes so the momentum of the play wasn’t lost.  I was particularly impressed by the way in which most of the pieces could be combined to form a serviceable model of Jack’s airplane, with the beds doubling up as the wings, and a free-standing fan serving as the propellor.

The back wall of the theatre acted as a cyclorama, and Jack’s beds-and-blackboard fighter soared persuasively through a projected cloudscape.  The impression was heightened by clever lighting which was picked out by the smoke which filled the stage, and by an almost overwhelming sound plot, full of the deafening roar of powerful engines and weapons fire, which hinted at the fear and confusion that the pilots must have experienced.  Projections, pieced together by the director, were also utilised in the scenes on the ground, with black and white archive footage interspersed with modern colour imagery.  There was no conflict between the two, partly because the light intensity from the projector onto the back wall wasn’t great which tended to wash out any colour, but mainly because the actors ensured that everyone’s attention was firmly on them rather than on anything that might be projected behind them.

I’m fond of remarking that a play defies categorisation: is it a drama or a farce, a send-up of a classic piece of literature or a light-hearted study of much-eulogised period of history?  This production of “Jack Absolute Flies Again” was all of these things and a great deal besides; as the old cliché goes, the whole was much more than the sum of its parts.  How can you describe a piece in which a humorous line such as “I’m not old.  I’ve just been here longer.” Is followed in short order by the poignant observation that “if I started crying, I would never stop”?  This was a great show – but then, I’m sure I heard recently that flatulence will get you everywhere …

© NODA CIO.  All rights reserved.

© NODA CIO. All rights reserved.