Look Back in Anger, John Osborne’s seminal 1956 work, captured the imagination of a generation. While this hackneyed phrase can be applied to almost every book or play that is any good, Look Back in Anger really did spawn a new era in British drama: Alan Sillitoe, one of the playwrights who wrote in the years after Look Back in Anger said Osborne “didn’t contribute to British theatre, he set off a landmine and blew most of it up”. Just like you remember where you were when the twin towers fell or, for a slightly older audience, when JFK was shot, theatre critics who grew up post-war remember their young selves pre- and post-Look Back in Anger.
Joining Bluebeard, the Oxford Revue and a mystery comedy act that the Revue will be taking along under their wing at the Edinburgh Fringe will be Eleanor Keel and Isabel Marr’s production of Look Back in Anger. Ellie Keel is a third year Italian and German student, who has sorted out a cast and crew for the show from her slightly inconvenient position as a primary teacher in Northern Italy. Rehearsals will begin in mid-July, concluding with a two-week run in Edinburgh in August.
Walking down Edinburgh’s Royal Mile in mid-August with leaflets being thrust at you from all directions, you could be forgiven for thinking that the Fringe is the single most important event in any student’s existence. So Ellie and Isabel’s unruffled approach is refreshing: “We’re not sure if it will be amazing. It’s a classic play and it’s not as experimental as some of the weirdest things the Fringe has to offer. But we hope that its simplicity will be a breath of fresh air in itself.”
Look Back in Anger was staged to great acclaim with Judi Dench and Kenneth Branagh in the classic 1989 production. Keel is keen that this not be a “carbon copy” of that production, as it is futile to try to replicate something as well-loved and cited.
They hope to capture the passion of the play in an abridged version, as the script is widely considered to be too long. It is easy to see similarities between playwright John Osborne’s life and views, and those of Jimmy. Their unhappy marriages are very similar, and Osborne was fundamentally unafraid to speak the unspeakable: this led him to question without ceremony the existence of the British monarchy, but also perhaps left him short-sighted when it came to editing Jimmy’s hard-hitting but manifold tirades. Cuts have been made but adaptation would be futile, as the play is so deeply rooted in the mindset of the 50s.
The now-familiar contemptuous anti-hero who rants his way through the political wrongs of the age was done first and best by Jimmy, Osborne’s ‘angry young man’ of the post-war Midlands. His tirades are full of delightful lyricism and uncomfortable violence: attacks on entrenched class divides are easy to nod along to, while the systematic and cruel undermining of his wife Alison is slightly more difficult to swallow.
Set in a small Derby flat which Alison and Jimmy share with their other flatmate Cliff, who is in love with Alison, the love-square is complete with the addition of Alison’s upper-class best friend, Helena. Lines like Jimmy’s musing that “it’s pretty dreary living in the American Age — unless you’re an American of course” still ring true.
Look Back in Anger hasn’t lost its kick with age: Jimmy’s resentment remains difficult to watch for a generation that has no shortage of ‘angry young men’ of its own. Here’s hoping this can be translated to the converted church in Edinburgh where it’s set to be staged.
