I’ve spoken at some length of my love for Leave Taking which tackles identity through the prism of immigration; there’ll be a post soon about An Octoroon (admittedly not British identity in this one), which tackles it through race and drama; this point deals with Brian Friel’s Translations, which tackles it through language. (I saw all three of these plays in one weekend by the way. It was intense.)
Translations, that classic of the A Level set text, tells a partly fictionalised history of the inhabitants of a small Irish town and their encounters with the English army cartographers who have come over to produce a detailed map of Ireland. Part of this process is the standardisation - Anglicisation - of the existing Gaelic place names. With one of the locals on the English payroll and one of the English soldiers desperately wanting to be a local chaos and complication inevitably ensues.
So far, so set text. But Friel’s play is much deeper than that. At its considerable heart, it is a complicated and funny love letter to the beauty, importance and downright strangeness of language - and I am here for that. There are some really beautiful scenes and moments, too many to list, but a favourite has to be the beautiful love scene between two characters who don’t speak each other’s languages but can, of course, still communicate their feelings. Language, after all, does not have to be spoken. But the most touching part of this scene is the role that the original Gaelic placenames play. They’re the one thing that both of the characters - a local woman and the aforementioned wannabe-local English soldier, who has been leading the efforts to change the placenames with rapidly decreasing enthusiam - understand the literal meaning of and so they acquire an emotional, romantic meaning all of their own just for this scene. It’s so lovely, and so well written. Though this is predominantly a ‘serious’ play there’s also a sense of mischief about it, especially in the shouting-and-pointing interactions between the decidedly more conservative English officer and the locals, which is a lot of fun and of course sets off the serious moments beautifully.
Friel also manages to do some clever things with his own authorial language, in that he apparently effortlessly manages to portray when characters are speaking English and when they’re speaking Gaelic, despite the fact they’re all speaking English all the time (apart from the occasional foray into Latin and Greek, naturally). It’s so subtle it hardly seems worth commenting on, until you take a step back and marvel at it from a distance. Less subtle but equally effective are the characters and setting he has created; all of which are so real and vivid you feel like you could reach out and touch them, foibles and mud and drizzle and all. I would’ve liked a fractionally more conclusive ending, but otherwise this is a little beauty of a play.
The sense of lushness that the text creates pierces the production too, most of all in Rae Smith’s design. The Olivier has scarcely looked more gorgeous than it does as home to Smith’s Irish landscape complete with rolling clouds of wispy smoke that combine with beautiful lighting and (I think) projection to create weather. It’s so atmospheric and evocative and I quite want to live there. There is a final moment, which I won’t spoil, that relies purely on the sudden stripping away of all this and which is done so well that the shock and discomfort it caused in the audience was audible. If I have a criticism of director Ian Rickson’s crisp and quick (not rushed) production it is this final moment though. I’m not it’s strictly necessary; it feels a mite forced. But this is proper nitpicking - you can’t argue with the impact it has nor the dexterity with which it’s done. And a shout out to a person I rarely mention too: Majella Hurley, the dialect coach, for helping build an assembly of pleasingly thick and faultlessly consistent Irish accents. All in all, this is a totally transporting production.
A small-for-the-Olivier cast rounds out a great evening. This is an NT-classy bunch and there’s really no one to pick fault with. The strongest performances come, for me, from Ciarán Hinds, on magisterial form (when is he not?) as the touchingly complex Hugh, recognising the death of his way of life and the need to move on but clinging to it - and his Latin and Greek - nonetheless. His final speech, which closes the play, is gorgeous. A superbly written and perfectly delivered evocation of identity and memory and loss and betrayal and hope that is, more than anything else, just a joy to hear. Colin Morgan as his ambitious son Owen brings a bucketload of charisma, exuberance and, ultimately, anger which combines to be endlessly watchable. He was something of a revelation for me. He’s a much better actor than I’ve ever given him credit for. Adetomiwa Edun rounds out my top three as the romantic English soldier, George. He’s fun, earnest, gentle and steely and I really missed him after the interval when, gorgeously unusual love scene aside, he really has nothing to do. I would quite happily have watched much more George. Translations II: George’s Revenge?
Lads, brace yourselves for shocking news. Translations is a show I really enjoyed, that’s on in the Olivier! A good show, in the Olivier!! A show with a full house, deservedly so, in the Olivier!!! It’s been so long I’d forgotten such a thing existed. But this is it. It’s pure class; a timely revival of a great and complex play in a solidly high calibre production that is exactly the sort of thing that I expect the National Theatre to be able to pull off better than anyone. Here they have, and it’s a joy.
Translations is in the Olivier at the NT (in rep) until 11th August. Tickets are scarce.
Speaking of tickets, yes I paid for mine: £36 for A62 in the circle. This is in the Travelex £15 season, but good luck finding a ticket left in that price bracket.
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