Cornelius

Synopsis

As unpaid bills flood in, Cornelius, partner at import firm Briggs and Murrison, is struggling to keep his creditors happy and his spirits up. With the collapse of foreign trade, and business changing from personalised service to catering for global mass markets, Cornelius is forced to confront the mental decline and suicide of his business partner Murrison, and his own impending bankruptcy. Miss Prism, the firm's loyal secretary, has been deeply in love with Cornelius for years, but her closeted world is challenged by the arrival of the young, free and optimistic typist, Judy, who shows Cornelius the life he could have once have led...

Our Review:

Michael Coveney - 17 August 2012

Like the Orange Tree, the Finborough explores parts of the repertoire the National Theatre won’t reach. This attractively strange and surprising 1935 play by J B Priestley, acutely well cast and directed by Sam Yates, has the added chill relevance of being about economic collapse and unemployment in a recession.

Alan Cox plays Jim Cornelius, partner in an aluminium importing firm in Holborn which is losing orders and facing angry creditors. The office is designed by David Woodhead in murky browns and creams, with filing cabinets, a bizarre telephone system and stray papers, desks crammed cheek by jowl, a last bastion of Dickensian inefficiency.

And as the crisis deepens, the office is visited by a stream of salesmen down on their luck, a devious client, the landlord’s daughter (neatly doubled by Beverley Klein with the office cleaning woman) and finally the firm’s senior partner, Robert Murrison (Jamie Newall), returning from a ...

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Latest User Review

Paul Bradshaw - 20 August 2012:

Super cast even down to the smallest parts. The quality of acting, direction and design shine through. I'd have bought some soap !...

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