Posh

This brilliant scene
follows the set-up: the revival of the Riot Club in times of political consensus
and lily-livered drifting by young Tom Hollander lookalike Guy Bellingford
(Joshua Maguire) and his ennobled uncle Jeremy (Simon Shepherd); in the same
hushed room, at the end, Jeremy sounds the all-clear for licensed posh barbarism
and hints at not only a cover-up, but a political
coup.

On first viewing in 2010,
before the general election, Posh seemed an exuberant satire on the Bullingdon
Club at Oxford, where the elite members – who, in the past, have included the
current Prime Minister, Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Mayor of London –
drink till they drop (ie, get well and truly “château-ed”), trash the dining
room and pay the bill, whatever it is, in crisp large
notes.

Now, with Ed Miliband
announcing in the House of Commons yesterday that, in spite of a coalition
government, the “nasty” party is back, the play gathers further strength. With a few sly re-writes, it has intensified that sense in the country of an
entitled ruling class feeling less sure of itself, and not just because the rest
of us are tramping through their country homes courtesy of the National
Trust.

“We might not be to your
taste, but we always pay our way,” says Leo Bill’s febrile, volcanic Alistair
Ryle – who is indeed easily riled, rather like David Cameron – before launching
into the shocking speech about how tired he is of poor people and all their
striving, “bursting a vein at the thought of there’s another floor their lift
doesn’t go up to”.

Bill is tremendous, and now
wears a tie (they read my first review!) for his fateful summons in the London
club, pushing his ‘poshness’ into a curiously emphatic, downmarket expression.
This is at one with the posh tendency to absorb rap and pop culture – as
evidenced in the brilliant a cappella ensemble items that punctuate the
hedonistic débâcle – and the appropriation of the term “mate”.

Lyndsey Turner’s
production really misses one or two of the original cast – there’s a lack of
definition here and there – and it was a common complaint around me in
the back stalls that the actors’ articulation and audibility are poor. Wade’s
scintillating construct of demotic dialogue, public schoolboy childishness and
yobbishness – the Riot Club really are the privileged cousins of last autumn’s
street protesters – deserves a better hearing.

Anthony Ward’s design of
the remote country pub is craftily contained within the Masonic club context:
the ghost of Lord Riot stalks the land, as well as the dinner, as the rituals
and debauchery accelerate to a terrible climax. On the way, Jessica Ransom as
the landlord’s daughter, and Charlotte Lucas as the lady of the night from the
escort agency, provide surprise, and sterling, resistance.