Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? at Maidment Theatre

Reviewed by PAUL SIMEI-BARTON

About 40 years after its controversial opening, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? seems assured of its place in the canon of 20th-century literature.

Colin McColl's no-frills production offers an opportunity to appreciate the qualities that have given this work a truly enduring appeal.

The play has been celebrated for its richly allusive language and thematic complexity, but this production highlights the raw emotional impact that arises out of Albee's unflinching portrayal of human frailty. For all its political resonance and linguistic dazzle, the real power of the play resides in the surface story, centred on the tempestuous love/hate relationship between George and Martha.

This is not to say that Albee's thematic concerns have lost relevance. He shows remarkable prescience in exploring the way contemporary life has eroded our ability to distinguish between illusion and reality.

The play has plenty to offer for a generation that is learning to deal with virtual reality, fictional wars and reality television.

If there is an anachronistic note it comes when the protagonist insists that it is better to destroy all illusions. In a post-modern era such optimism seems touchingly naive.

McColl has assembled a strong cast and scores a king-hit by casting David McPhail as George. Auckland audiences have had limited opportunities to see McPhail on stage and his assured performance is a revelation.

Delighting in the cruel repartee of his duel with Martha, he endures abject humiliation without any loss of dignity, then abruptly takes charge of events like a demented circus-master relentlessly driving his players into ever more daring feats of degradation.

Jennifer Ludlum brings poise and emotional intensity to her portrayal of Martha, but in the gruelling rounds of game-playing she is unable to match the gleeful malice with which McPhail assails his opponents.

The younger couple, Nick and Honey, have the unenviable task of allowing themselves to be used as pawns in the vicious power struggle between George and Martha.

Gareth Reeves as an ambitious biology professor projects an alluring physical confidence, making him the perfect target for Martha's salacious flirtations, and occasionally allowing him to deflect George's malevolent irony.

Hera Dunleavy portrays the nervous and neurotic faculty wife with a fragile vulnerability that makes George's mockery appear particularly heartless.

David Thornley's spectacular stage set uses spatial distortion to transform a modern living room into the kind of surrealistic arena de Chirico might have painted.

McColl's finely judged sense of rhythm and tone kept the audience totally engaged throughout a three-hour journey which sees the fun and frivolity of the first act rapidly giving way to nightmarish cruelties of a Black Sabbath and exorcism.