Resident Alien

I once had the misfortune of watching Tim Fountain get cajoled into drinking a glass of fresh urine during the course of a slightly riotous performance of his notorious one-man show, Sex Addict at the 2004 Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Thankfully, the return of Resident Alien, which Fountain has written and directed, leaves a more pleasant aftertaste.

Resident Alien premiered at the Bush Theatre in 1999 and has since had a handful of revivals both in the UK and in New York. Bette Bourne, who starred in the original Bush production and several other revivals to date, reprises his role as the legendary and effeminate eccentric, Quentin Crisp. Dirty, frail and dishevelled, we find him manned up at the age of 90 in his grotty one room apartment in a boarding house in New York. His musings range precariously over such far flung topics as the death of Princess Diana, politics, and book reviewing, but are always delivered with perfect comic timing and grace by the fabulous Bourne, who relishes the role from start to finish, spilling out his acerbic wit with a glittering eye and a wry smile.

One-man shows are notoriously risky, depending largely on the strength of their leading light, but on the 100th anniversary of Quentin Crisp’s birth, Bette Bourne, heaped with praise in previous renditions of the show, once again sails through the performance with style and showmanship, endowing Fountain’s script, which was written with Crisp’s full co-operation and the exclusive use of his New York Diaries, with a delicate energy. Bourne avoids relying too heavily on the entertainment value of Crisp’s observations, brilliantly quotable though they are, managing to bring the character to life as a sort of bravado spitting geriatric with a strangely haunted demeanour. Despite his many protestations to the contrary, the presence of a telephone that simply refuses to ring communicates a heart wrenching loneliness.

Designer Paul Shaw creates a suitably shabby set, reflecting Crisp’s total disdain for household chores such as washing up or dusting, and David W Kidd’s lighting design sees the room glowing from the stark light of a single uncovered bulb set starkly on an overflowing bookshelf, but Resident Alien’s success is owed in most part to Bourne, and his spectacularly robust performance.

-Kate Jackson

NOTE: The following FOUR-STAR review dates from 12 December 2001 when this production was in London.

Don’t be fooled – an evening with the original Englishman in New York is no walk in Central Park. As you enter the theatre before the curtain rises on Tim Fountain’s Resident Alien, the dulcet tones of Frank Sinatra lull you into a false sense of security. But take one look at the set, and you’re soon immersed in the shabby, bedsit world of Quentin Crisp (pictured) – the writer, actor, legendary wit and gay rights campaigner who died in 1999.

The piece opens with Crisp watching TV under the covers, sniggering rather like a naughty schoolboy. Indeed, there is something decidedly wide-eyed and boyish about this 90-year-old queen, rendered by Bette Bourne (who, in real life, was a close friend of Crisp’s) – especially when he talks lovingly of the Big Apple where he now resides. But his musings don’t stop with New York, moving on to address an eclectic spectrum of subjects, including Oprah and Princess Diana. One by one, he sets them up and shoots them down, systematically annihilating all things conventional. Marriage, education, politics, and even modern gay culture – nothing escapes Crisp’s amusingly acerbic if dark wit.

Given that Resident Alien is based largely on Crisp’s own diaries, it’s little wonder that it rings so true. Fountain doesn’t mess with the goods, opting for scripting and direction that are subtle and natural, thank goodness.

Bourne’s characterisation – including nasal drawl and inveterate preening – is also spot-on. Though his Crisp can be socially irritating and visually grotesque (in cringe-worthy “panto dame” style), he’s so human that you can’t help but become overly fond and protective of him. It’s all the more heartrending then when the disparities between his agile mind and feeble, eczema-ridden body become more and more apparent.

Is his longevity a triumph of life over death or a drawn-out torture? “I’m ready for death but just won’t die”, Crisp cries at one point. And yet he seems to relish his solitary life interrupted only by the phone, Fed Ex man or the Hell’s Angels who live next door – so perhaps the sympathy is misplaced. Either way, this is a moving homage to a fascinating modern icon.

– Hannah Khalil