Adapted from a new text which includes some sections originally censored for excessively homosexual undertones, this exciting new version of Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Grayis a noble effort to transfer this most beguiling of novels onto the stage, recalling, intentionally or not, Shakespeare, Greek tragedy, the problems of ageing female BBC presenters and, of course, the whole question of censorship in literature. One of the characters remarks that ‘it’s bad for morals to see wooden acting’, and – thankfully for the actor who gives this hostage to fortune – there is little woodenness in evidence in Dorian.
From the scenes previewed, particularly engaging were those featuring Jordan Waller as Lord Henry Wotton and Jamie MacDonagh’s Dorian. In the first scene, Lord Henry appears overbearingly camp and creepy yet strikingly erudite, a deeply unsettling combination, while Dorian is naive, simultaneously wooed by and wooing the visiting aristocrat. Waller’s Wotton is probably the strongest performance (although not everyone had as much stage time in the preview, so comparisons are probably a little unfair). The ‘dichotomous’ character of Lord Henry, as Jordan put it, requires a hugely impressive emotional range, which he deploys with aplomb. Ziad Samaha as the Picture handles very effectively a daunting role with the epigram of having ‘lots to do and nothing at all’, a hurdle overcome through what we are starting to recognise as the textbook Samaha combination of smouldering looks and an air of dismissive superiority over everyone in the room. It is a compelling performance that can only be enhanced by his being surrounded by a huge frame and shorn into the likeness of McDonagh.
There were a few tantalising vignettes featuring the scene-stealing chorus, a tragedy-inspired innovation of Lucinda Dawkins and Adam Scott-Taylor, the directors and adapters, used to cover the huge chunks of dialogue-free prose in Wilde’s text. Sybil Vane’s (Nouran Koriem) intentional impression of a bad actress in the second scene I saw was very convincing, although unfortunately the subsequent encounter between her and Dorian had the capacity to send the real audience into the same embarrassing slumber affected by the chorus on stage: by next week ther ewill need to be much more life in her perhaps overly-long speech to match the energy and pace of MacDonagh’s Dorian.
Chatting to the set designer afterwards,it was clear that she and her team have put in a huge amount of work to meet the whims of directors Lucinda and Adam: from what they described, it sounds like it could be a great sight, full of the opulent, garish vividity that one would expect from Wilde, draped in velvet and floored in marble. I am looking forward to seeing it! Dorian wasn’t perfect, but it was an engaging and exciting production, striking the right balance of high drama, emotional engagement, homoerotic flirting and entrancing looks from the male leads. It looks set to draw in a big crowd at the Playhouse in 2nd week.
3.5 stars
Oxford Playhouse, 19:30 Wed-Sat 2nd Week
