Betrayal

by Harold Pinter

seen at the Harold Pinter Theatre on 17 May 2019

Jamie Lloyd directs Tom Hiddleston as Robert, Zawe Ashton as Emma (his wife) and Charlie Cox as Jerry (his best friend) in a superb revival of Pinter's play about a the inricacies ad emotional costs of betrayal.

The design by Soutra Gilmour is mesmerisingly austere - a pastel shaded backdrop which occasionally slides forward; a grey floor containing a two-part revolve; a couple of chairs; at one stage a flimsy fold-out table; a few bottles of drinks (water or wine). This forces all the attention on the actors and on the psychological processes of the characters, and allows for maximum fluidity in a play that famously presents its story in reverse, starting with a meeting between Emma and Jerry two years after their seven-year affair has ended, and working gradually backwards until the first occasion on which Jerry confessed his love for Emma.

Splendour

by Abi Morgan

seen at the Donmar Warehouse on 6 August 2015

The play, directed by Robert Hastie and designed by Peter McKintosh, features Sinéad Cusack as Micheleine, the wife of a dictator, Michelle Fairley as her friend Genevieve, Zawe Ashton as Gilma, an interpreter, and Genevieve O'Reilly as Kathryn, a visiting photojournalist. It is set on the evening of a coup in an unnamed (generic) dictatorship.

In a series of scenes which often replay fragmented pieces of dialogue between the four women, we gradually gain an impression of the catastrophic political events taking place outside the presidential palace as Micheleine tries to entertain Kathryn until her husband the president appears for a photo session. It becomes clear that the man will not turn up, that in fact he has fled for his life abandoning his wife to her fate. The friend Geraldine has been co-opted to help on the occasion, but she brings bitter memories and recriminations reflecting badly on the president and Micheleine. Gilma, acting as interpreter between Kathryn and the other two, subversively mis-translates when it suits her, and purloins objects into her bag or pockets, thinking that the others do not notice - or not really caring whether they do or not.