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The Art of Concealment - The Life of Terrence Rattigan

Jermyn Street Theatre, Inner London
From: Monday, 9th January 2012
To: Saturday, 28 January 2012

Our Review: starstarstar

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Synopsis

He was one of the most acclaimed playwrights and screenwriters of his generation. His fall from critical favour marked a turning point in modern British theatre. He wore a carefully constructed mask of respectable, suave gentility in order to conceal his true nature, but who was the man behind the mask? Who was the real Terence Rattigan? Terence Rattigan, one of the most acclaimed playwrights and screenwriters of his generation This is a play not only about the demons that haunted one of our great playwrights, but about the creative process itself, and the process of ageing, of loss, of unhappiness in love, and of ultimate disillusionment - with the ironic twist that we know Rattigan to be more honoured now, at the centenary of his birth, than he would ever have expected in his lifetime.

Our Review: starstarstar

12 January 2012

For 20 years from 1936 to 1956, Terence Rattigan was the star of British playwrights. From French Without Tears to The Deep Blue Sea, his plays ranked among the best and most popular in the West End. Then along came Osborne and Orton and the rise of the "kitchen sink drama". Rattigan's closely observed but decidedly middle-class dramas fell out of favour and, almost overnight, his audiences went elsewhere. Even worse, the critics tore him to shreds.

Giles Cole's The Art of Concealment uses the well-worn theatrical device of the old, dying writer looking back over his life with a candour that may only come to those near death. The younger Rattigan, played with verve and many cigarettes by Dominic Tighe, is arrogant, manipulative of his friends and lovers and keeps his emotions tightly concealed since to reveal his homosexuality at that time would have destroyed his reputation and risked his imprisonment.

Unfortunately, the direction of t...

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Creative

Giles Cole (Author)
John B Hobbs (Producer)
GC Productions (in association with Jermyn Street Theatre) (Producer)
Knight Mantell (Director)
Meg Witts (Design)
John B Hobbs (Producer)
GC Productions (Producer)


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