A Woman Killed with Kindness

Synopsis

A Woman Killed with Kindness is a passionate Yorkshire tragedy and colourful portrayal of 17th Century domestic rural life. Frankford, a country gentleman, is husband to Anne, the 'perfect' wife. But their happily married life is thrown into disarray when he discovers Anne in the arms of another man. Banished to a life of luxury, but prohibited from seeing her husband or children again, Anne pays a terrible price.

Our Review:

Michael Coveney - 20 July 2011

Katie Mitchell made her RSC debut with this play twenty years ago, the first time Thomas Heywood’s superb Jacobean domestic tragedy of two disastrous marriages in the English countryside had been seen since John Dexter’s austere and revelatory production (starring Anthony Hopkins and Joan Plowright) for the National at the Old Vic.

She obviously feels passionately about the piece, but I’m not sure that this new version on the vast Lyttelton stage – updated loosely to the 1920s, and placing the adulterous Anne Frankford (Liz White) alongside the abused sister (Sandy McDade) of a ruined squire in a scenic juxtaposition of pianos and staircases – is an improvement.

Like Dexter, Mitchell initially presented the play on a bare stage and gave full value to the bleached realism of the sinuous verse, the outdoor imagery of hawks and hunting, penury and death. And she obliterated all the orthodox objections to the sub-plot by making ...

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Latest User Review

David Baxter - 24 August 2011:

Katie Mitchell just can't help herself. Even in a relatively straightforward (for her) adaptation of a Jacobean tragedy she can't resist adding the choreographed scene changes which were so unintentionally funny in Pains of Youth. Even the two main female characters are picked up and carted around like props, although maybe that's supposed to symbolise their status as mere chattels - God knows, but it looks ridiculous. The decision to set the play in 1919 serves no useful purpose and means that references to a character being manacled in a dungeon of a debtor's prison absurd. Mitchell has, as usual, taken substantial liberties with the text, although thankfully without Martin Crimp's "help", meaning that the young wife's betrayal of her husband makes little dramatic sense. Mitchell has gained some excellent performances, which is not always the case with her shows; Paul Ready, Liz White and Gawn Grainger are particularly impressive, but Leo Bill basically repeats his shouty performance from Posh at the Royal Court. So the 4 stars must be a mistake. No, because despite all Mitchell's eccentricities I really enjoyed this play. Some of Thomas Heywood's rhymes may have brought some unintended laughs but his story of two women, one who destroys her marriage and loses her children and another who is forced into marriage with a man she despises to pay her brother's debts, has an intensity which holds the attention for all of the uninterrupted two hours. It's a superb drama given a rather odd production, but what else would you expect from such an eccentric director?...

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