Right Now (A Présent) (Ustinov Studio)
After a rather so-so year for the Ustinov Studio in 2015, they have returned with a bang with Right Now (A Présent) an elliptical, erotic and gently heart-breaking work from Québecer Catherine-Ann Toupin, the first play in the Canadian season at the Bath studio.
Alice (Lindsey Campbell) and Ben (Sean Biggerstaff) have just moved into a plush new apartment, its décor a minimalist and bibliophile dream in Madeleine Girling’s sleek design. For all the material wealth there is something not right: Ben is working frequently long hours, physical contact between the couple is tense, intimacy is non-existent and there are echoing cries of a baby that appears not to exist. They are a couple in crisis, both full of unspoken feeling and desire, a melting pot into which the next door neighbours; couple Juliette and Giles and their young son François enter and shake things up.
What starts off as innocent invitations for drinks and hors d’oeuvres soon turns into passionate encounters and revelations about loss. At the point you feel you have a handle on where the piece is going, it flips; turns into a different kind of work entirely, becoming an unofficial third part of the triptych of unreliable narratives and fractured memories that started with Florian Zeller’s The Father and The Mother. It’s less tricksy then either, it never disorientates in the same way and its final moments don’t have the undoubted gut punch that both those works contained.
What it does have instead is atmosphere. There is simmering sexual frisson here which is rare, tingles of feeling pulsing through the audience as seduction games are played and with just the barest hints of flesh being displayed make you feel like a voyeur catching something you really shouldn’t. Michael Boyd, who has become a Ustinov regular since leaving the RSC, produces his finest work for the venue here. It’s there in the tableaux he creates: painterly frames as the neighbours are introduced as one at the party, in the building of erotic tension that explodes into Bacchanal excess and in the quieter later scenes which mirror directly the earlier scenes with different protagonists. From Aristotle onwards there has been a link between sex and death, Boyd’s production balances both while gradually reeling you into its stranger notes.
Campbell, still in the early stages of her career but becoming a Boyd regular, keeps control over her character’s emotional turbulence and confusion before willingly letting herself be seduced like some nymph discovering sexual awakening. Maureen Beattie adds another great performance to her CV, early on wittering away like a Scottish Mrs Doyle before turning into a predatory cougar, reigning in her prey like a gecko swallowing a fly. Biggerstaff’s Ben has no chance of escaping her reigns just as Campbell’s Alice has no way of stopping her animalistic urge with Guy Williams' smooth author developing into carnal coupling on the kitchen table. Dyfan Dwyfor starts off as the creepy son of the amorous couple but later develops into something much more complex and interesting.
The whole thing is given a robust translation by Royal Court literary manager Chris Campbell and its high production values give the whole thing a smooth sleekness. French Canadian work has very rarely breached these shores, more discoveries like this, and literary managers will soon be flocking further north of New York to find their next hits.
Right Now (A Présent) runs at the Theatre Royal Bath until 19 March.
