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Synopsis Benjamin Britten, sailing uncomfortably close to the wind with his new opera, Death in Venice, seeks advice from his former collaborator and friend, W H Auden. During this imagined meeting, their first for twenty-five years, they are observed and interrupted by, amongst others, their future biographer and a young man from the local bus station. Alan Bennett’s new play is as much about the theatre as it is about poetry or music. It looks at the unsettling desires of two difficult men, and at the ethics of biography. It reflects on growing old, on creativity and inspiration, and on persisting when all passion’s spent: ultimately, on the habit of art. World Premiere NT Live: Live Broadcast to UK cinemas Ap10 22nd 2010
Alan Bennett's highly-anticipated new play The Habit of Art premiered at the NT Lyttelton last night (17 November 2009, previews from 5 November), marking a return to the venue and director (Nicholas Hytner) that staged his 2004 mega hit The History Boys.
The Habit of Art examines the stormy relationship between composer Benjamin Britten and poet WH Auden, imagining a reunion between the former friends 25 years after they last saw each other. Also containing scenes set in the rehearsal room of a play called Caliban's Day (the original title until Hytner suggested the current one), it was described by the director recently as being “about the business of putting a play together as much as it is about making music or poetry”.
"A smash hit if I ever saw one" writes Charles Spencer in the Daily Telegraph, leading a chorus of colleagues in praising Bennett's first play since the hugely acclaimed History Boys. But despite a clutch of five star ratings, not all overnight reviewers were in agreement, with some accusing The Habit of Art of being overly "self-referential" with its theatrical focus and "rather contrived". But director Nicholas Hytner was singled out by most for his "superbly fluid" production of a Bennett's intricate play-within-a-play, even if some still found the structure overly complex, containing "enough layers to make Pirandello blanch" in the words of Michael Billington. Meanwhile, Richard Griffiths and Alex Jennings were generally considered excellent as the "dried up" Auden and "prissy" Britten.
Michael Coveney on Whatsonstage.com (five stars) - “The Habit of Art, Alan Bennett’s first new play for five years is a brilliant, witty and highly enjoyable meditation on the ethics and methods of biography, friendship in art, and the business of putting on a play. It’s deliciously funny, too, on the subject of the love that cannot speak its name because it has its mouth full … It is 1972 and Bennett has ingeniously engineered a fictional reunion of the two friends after 20 years … There are two great conversational scenes between Auden and Britten but Nicholas Hytner’s superbly light-fingered production is really an exercise in the open-ended, provisional nature of all theatre, with a rousing defense of the medium, and of the National itself.”
Paul Taylor in the Independent (five stars) - “Because of the play-within-a-play structure, Richard Griffiths, heroically and superlatively replacing the indisposed Michael Gambon, plays both Auden and Fitz, the mountainous, heterosexual, amiably forgetful actor who has taken on the role. The incongruity is wonderfully entertaining, rather as though nice, equable old Arthur Negus had been cast as Genet … Nicholas Hytner directs with an unerring instinct for the volatile nature of the material in a cracking production that flirtatiously keeps the audience up to speed with the outrageous amount of information and allusion ... Hytner revealed at a press conference that Bennett at one stage wanted to call the play Caliban’s Day and you can see why. For just as The Sea and the Mirror, Auden’s poetic meditation on The Tempest gives the last word to the low-class monster, so Bennett allows the rent-boy to speak up at the conclusion for the culturally excluded bit-players who service the educated but don’t get a look-in at life’s ongoing arts festival.”
Benedict Nightingale in The Times (three stars) - “So much of The Habit of Art is so engaging, it seems churlish to point out its basic problem: which is that even the excellence of Richard Griffiths and Alex Jennings can’t stop one feeling that Bennett doesn’t fully trust his material. He isn’t confident that his portraiture can sustain a full-length play … With even the furniture adding to the dialogue, so that a chair calls Auden an 'odiferous poet with a face like his balls', there’s an obvious danger of confusion. Yet, thanks to the fluent production that Nicholas Hytner stages in what’s partly a rehearsal room, partly Auden’s gloriously messy Oxford digs, the result is only thematically a muddle … But better a multi-course Bennett banquet than almost anyone else’s neat meal, especially when the lead actors are so strong.””
Michael Billington in the Guardian (four stars) - “Artists in their late work often feel free to digress and experiment. Alan Bennett takes full advantage of this licence in a multi-levelled work that deals with sex, death, creativity, biography and much else besides. And, while it may not possess the universal resonance of The History Boys, the play has the characteristic Bennett mix of wit and wistfulness … The structure is certainly complex … it will be seen that the play has enough layers to make Pirandello blanch … Bennett's play is at its strongest when it deals with the theme implicit in its title: the idea that, for the artist, creativity is a constant, if troubling imperative. Temperamentally, the two men could hardly be more different: the one a model of restraint, the other an apostle of sexual freedom and something of an intellectual bully … A play that could easily seem tricksy is also given a superbly fluid production by Nicholas Hytner and is beautifully acted.”
Charles Spencer in the Daily Telegraph (five stars) - “I thought it unlikely that he would be able to equal the success of The History Boys (2004) but The Habit of Art is another absolute cracker … the older he gets, the more daring and ambitious Bennett seems to become … In lesser hands the framing device might have become more interesting than the story of Auden and Britten. With extraordinary panache, however, Bennett and his director Nicholas Hytner, keep us equally interested in both the rehearsal process and the portrait of Auden and Britten … Richard Griffiths makes you care about Auden’s frailty and dried up talent while also playing an actor who can’t remember his lines and hates the way Auden is presented. Alex Jennings is superb, too, as the pained, prissily fastidious Britten and as a college scout grumbling about the squalor of Auden’s room … The Habit of Art is a smash hit if I ever saw one.”
Henry Hitchings in the Evening Standard (three stars) - “A new Alan Bennett play is an event. This is especially true since 2004’s The History Boys … The Habit of Art is less straightforwardly rewarding. It’s funny, and sometimes brilliantly so, but strangely uninvolving. Although Bennett savours his material, he doesn’t make it sing … Bennett continues his concern with the relationship between homosexuality and creativity. Sexual misunderstandings provide moments of ripe humour … Fundamentally, though, this is a cerebral and self-referential play. Bennett proffers some wonderful lines. The performances are proficient, and Nicholas Hytner’s direction is fluid. However, lurking awkwardly inside this rather contrived creation is a different, more emotionally resonant play. It’s a shame that it’s been submerged. ”
Quentin Letts in the Daily Mail - “Alan Bennett, being English, hates to be too ‘artsy’ and instead wraps serious subjects in layers of comedy. He is at it again with his latest play, which is satirical, serious and self-indulgent, sometimes all at the same time … We are also introduced to Auden’s former friend Benjamin Britten (Alex Jennings, nicely queeny). Frances de la Tour does a lovely turn as a laconic stage manager … There are various other theatrical ‘in’ jokes. Good fun, but of limited appeal. Mr Bennett may feel he has deserved a chance to be skittish and he may be right … Elliot Levey is excellent as the pretentious author of the Auden/Britten play, mouthing the lines as he watches the rehearsals. The bad language and gags about men’s appendages become a little tiresome after the first hour … Shorn of the Bennettesque larking about, that might have made a better play, even if it might not have given a willing audience so many throaty laughs.”
The Habit of Art, Alan Bennett’s first new play for five years is a brilliant, witty and highly enjoyable meditation on the ethics and methods of biography, friendship in art, and the business of putting on a play. It’s deliciously funny, too, on the subject of the love that cannot speak its name because it has its mouth full.
The poet W H Auden (Richard Griffiths, all baggy and bitchy, like a monster prickly pear) is waiting in his chaotic Oxford rooms, designed by Bob Crowley, for a rent boy to swallow his pride before dinner. On a higher level, in every sense, the composer Benjamin Britten (Alex Jennings, uptight, prissy and over-sensitive) is auditioning choir boys for the role of Tadzio in his forthcoming, and last, discreet opera of gay yearning, Death in Venice.
It is 1972 and Bennett has ingeniously engineered a fictional reunion of the two friends after 20 years. Even more ingeniously, this is contained in a play-within-a-play in the rehearsal room where Frances de la Tour’s world-weary stage manager Kay is “running” the script in the absence of the director who is attending a conference about regional theatre in Leeds.
Auden is interrupted by the arrival of his future biographer (and Britten’s), Humphrey Carpenter – “I’m not a rent boy, I was at Keble” – played with glorious, scruffy intensity by Adrian Scarborough whose idea – as the “actor” playing Humphrey – of bolstering the show, and his own contribution, is to open the second act as Douglas Byng in drag singing “I’m Doris the goddess of wind”.
There are two great conversational scenes between Auden and Britten but Nicholas Hytner’s superbly light-fingered production is really an exercise in the open-ended, provisional nature of all theatre, with a rousing defense of the medium, and of the National itself, in Kay’s encomium to one of Bennett’s early directors, Ronald Eyre.
And exploiting Auden’s obsession with The Tempest, the rent boy Stuart (Stephen Wight) is allowed his moment in the sun, justifying the play’s alternative title of “Caliban’s Day”.
“Why does a play always have to be such a performance?” is the ambiguously inflected question represented on stage in the impatient, tetchy figure of Elliot Levey’s script-shuffling author and the hilarious speeches of talking furniture “filled in” (actors are missing at a Chekhov matinee next door) by Kay and John Heffernan’s effetely unselfconscious ASM.
Thank goodness I'm not the only one! The 2 and 3 star reviews above say it all. I saw it at The Lowry two days after the most wonderful production of Stoppard's Arcadia (Manchester Library Theatre, directed by Chris Honer)... Stoppard, with lightness of touch, said an amazing amount about nearly everything... To me, Bennett said an amazing amount about precious little of any importance... - Donald Judge
10 Oct 10
amazing. GO SEE IT! loved the play within a play concept, which allows the 'actors' and 'crew' to comment on the material. very poignant ending. fab original cast and isn't Stephen Wight a little cutie! catch it on tour in the Autumn! - PG
05 May 10
Round two! Much better second time around. The whole piece seemed tighter, well it has run in. Seeing it once already helped. Mr Bennett is undoubtedly a genius. Richard Griffiths lost the Hector ghost that seemed to haunt him before and Alex Jennings' is a model of restraint as Britten. 10/10 - rds
04 Apr 10
Felt like Ernie Wise (The Play What I Wrote) mixed with Mark Ravenhill. Entertaining, but I couldn't see any point to it. - addicted to theatre
29 Jan 10
My expectations may have been too high? This is not The History Boys and I suspect I was not the only one in the audience thinking that on Friday night. Like Gareth James I too couldn't help wondering what Michael Gambon would have made of the part and after a little while I began to wish he hadn't pulled out for there is far too much of Hector about Richard Griffith's performance and having Mrs Lintott there too doesn't help either. Sure Alan Bennett has produced some juicy lines, but it is all very contrived and, I am sad to say, seemingly played for cheap laughs. Let's hope Mr Bennett hasn't lost his touch, only his way. You will need to pay strict attention or risk getting lost in the plot so perhaps avoid alcohol if you can, well, at least until the interval! And one other thing, what is it with his obsession with characters whom have a penchant for boys, is he trying to tell us something about himself? - rds
25 Jan 10
4.5 if available. For once, the play-within-a-play device works as it makes sense of a fictitious reunion between Auden and Britten and allows a discussion of Death in Venice to act as a metaphor fot their different attitudes to their sexuality, which had caused the falling-out so many years before. The structure also provides an excuse for exposition so it is not necessary to have any prior knowledge of the life or works of either Auden or Britten. Alan Bennett's script is thoughtful, witty and frequently downright filthy and includes some wonderful theatrical in-jokes, mostly at the expense of the pretentious writer. Bennett slightly resembles Auden - Richard Griffiths certainly doesn't (even in a hysterical mask) but he and Alex Jennings are wonderful as the two leads and there is excellent support from Adrian Scarborough, Stephen Wight and especially Frances de la Tour. Not quite vintage Bennett but still far superior to the vast majority of new plays on offer elsewhere. - David Baxter
12 Jan 10
Well. Isn't this lovely! Coming to the theatre and having a rip rollicking time watching an Allen Bennett play. Oh!! It's like a play within a play. The play is one big theatrical anecdote and the play within the play is, like, about art and shit. OOHH, was that a swear word in an Allan Bennett play, well that may get passed the 1,200 liberals in the audience. OOOHHH, was that a sequence of cock gags.... well, that is 'forward looking'!... OOOOHHHH is it STILL going!! I cant believe that half these actors are still alive, let alone speaking. AH!! It's finished. Well that was.... no no no... it's still on.... AAHH! NOW it's finished..... NO NO NO.. Frances de La 'stolen the WHOLE show' tour is having a monologue because she hasn't had one yet, and then, after all, she IS a former actress now all knowing stage manager. In the play. Not in real life. It would be awfull if she were a stage manager in real life, because then, stage management would be like, fun. You know, because, like, life and art are like the same thing, even though they are different... Lovely! it's finished. Well that was both symbolic and fun. lets go and get completely twatted on booze and watch porn. - Cassox
03 Jan 10
This isn't Premiere League Bennett, but it's still one of the best new plays this year. What makes it a winner is the cleverness of play-within-a-play structure and some absolutely cracking lines. Looking at Richard Griffiths, I'm afraid I couldn't help thinking what Michael Gambon would have made of the part. Alex Jennings role is a bit under-written, Stephen Wight is excellent, but its Frances de la Tour who really holds it all together. - Gareth James
19 Dec 09
I went there on Dec 10th and enjoyed every minute of it. Top acting, comic moments but also deep situations.
England's people should feel proud having such actors and actresses and productions. - Pit, Germany
15 Dec 09
I didn't think Alan Bennett could ever write a better play than 'The History boys', but he has done so. He has said that he identifies more with Britten than with Auden, but it is Auden who comes over as the more sympathetic character, and that is entirely due to the extraordinary performance of Richard Griffiths. The initial disappointment at the withdrawal of Michael Gambon has been entirely forgotten; I can't imagine that Gambon could have done it any better. Alex Jennings as Britten slightly overdoes the prissiness, I feel. Frances de la Tour as the stage manager and Adrian Scarborough as a bemused Humphrey Carpenter are, as always, first-rate. The play has everything: humour, a debate on the ethics of biography, a discussion on the relative importance of words and music in opera and the necessity of just 'keeping on'. But most moving is the portrayal of encroaching old age and its effect on two of the world's greatest artists - an issue which Bennett himself must be much exercised by in his 75th year. It also has Bennett's characteristic lack of sentimentality and complete honesty. It is a joy from beginning to end. The best play from the National for many a year. - sc
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