The Brothers by Paul O’ Neill/Duck VariationsBy David Mamet @The Old Joint Stock
A couple of years ago I caught a production of Harold Pinter’s The Lover by an independent Theatre company. It was a quite remarkable production by a group of actors who handled Pinter’s particular and delicate use of language seemingly with ease, but I was also struck by the venue itself, The old joint stock Theatre based alongside colmore row in Birmingham’s city centre. An elegant venue, with the hustle and bustle of people merrily drinking away the woes of a working week downstairs providing something of a relaxing atmosphere before heading upstairs to the studio Theatre, where an even merrier, sort of, haven of art exsisted amongst the escapist attitudes of drinking gamers that, by the majority of people in the building, inhabited the place. So, I was quite eager to revisit the venue for the debut production of Theatre Company Duck Brothers productions, a dual revival of Paul O’ Neill’s The Brothers and David Mamets Duck Variations.
The evening kicked off with The Brothers, a short one act by a writer I’m not too familiar with by the name of Paul O’ Neill. It’s essentially a black comedy about two Irish Brothers, who come from a family of butchers and run a butcher shop themselves, who are now living in New York. Breaking the fourth wall, the whole play follows the relatively simple, if hard to acheive, struture of these two brothers, Matt and Pat, explaining to the audience, through humor, the rather weird pact they made with their live in house maid Mary in regards of how they would dispose of her body if she died (This show really isn’t for the particularly quesy). The Brothers is well written and rather funny but doesn’t really add up too much. Then, who says it has too? It’s an audience pleasing, well directed, funny hour of Theatre. The performance of Henry Amphlett and David Rex as the two brothers was spot on. Their comic timing was great and, most importantly, they had the right amount of brotherly chemistry. All in all, it was an enjoyable piece.
After a short interval, here came the reason I bought my ticket, David Mamets Duck Variations. When reading early Mamet, Duck Variations had always been one of my favorite of those younger, becket inspired Mamet shorts, of course, as it is rarely revived these day’s, I’d never seen it performed. Like so many other writer’s before him, Mamet has kind of lifted Becket’s Waiting for Godot, only here, its two older guys in a park discussing ducks as a subtext for deeper more profound thought. I was struck by just how different the Mamet we know now has grown from the Mamet of yore. I could imagine todays more conservative, plot driven Mamet deriding a young writer for penning such an open ended, ambiguous piece as pretentious and not concerned enough with ‘Getting asses in seat’s’. Which of the two Mamet’s is right- or more exciting- of course, is subjective (and something which, I personally am always indecisive about). David Rex does a good job with George, giving a studied, understated performance Mamet would approve of but, for me, it was Dean Taylor who impressed most as Emil. Playing Emil with the right amount of uncertainty, indecisiveness and sort of wandering charm he asks the audience of its most emotional responses. Both Actors managed Mamet’s poetry well and with care; as always, you could sit and simply listen to Mamets dialogue for hours on end, whilst Mamet’s pholosophy might change from time to time his musical use of language never does. Duck Variations is still my favorite of those early Mamet shorts even if, unlike present day Mamet, it refuses to tackle things head on and sometimes allows its audience to confuse ambiguity with the profound. What it does have is a sense of unpredictabillity, a sense of excitement that, perhaps, some of Mamets later more well structured work has lacked. Anyway, who cares what Mamet you’re getting, its Mamet and pretty much everything he has ever written is worth the price of admission.
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