Photo: Trsitram Kenton
The anything-is-theatre brigade may get a kick out of Lifegame. I found the idea of an on-stage Cottesloe interview with improvisations from Improbable Theatre to be as patronising as it was uninformative.
Last night Lee Simpson interviewed Tony Harley, the National's health and safety manager. Asked to provide his epitaph, Mr Harley came up with "basically a good guy" which was embarrassingly chalked up on a blackboard. Clearly an easygoing but shy man, Mr Harley talked warily about his upbringing in a peripatetic Northern Irish naval family. But I can't think of anything more inhibiting than the idea that scenes from one's personal life are to performed by a group of paid-up exhibitionists. Devised by Keith Johnstone, the whole format is deeply suspect. The intention is to provide an "accurate" picture of the interviewee's life: public improvisation, however, inevitably acquires a revuesketch slickness.
You saw the dilemma when Mr Harley described a golden moment in a Lyme Regis cafe with his girlfriend when "not a lot was said". What you wanted was an evocation of silent happiness: what you got was one of the Improbables doing a perky-waiter routine backed by soupy music and taped seagulls.
The other fallacy is that people are at their best when talking about intimate experiences.
Actually most people acquire articulacy when discussing their work. Mr Harley became visibly animated when recalling his 10 years in aircraft-maintenance and a near-death experience. I was only astonished that Lee Simpson never went on to inquire about his job at the National and the hazards to health and safety in a vast theatrical complex.
The best moment came when Mr Harley was asked to embody his maternal grandfather. Julian Crouch sculpted a mask out of foam rubber and fitted it to Mr Harley's face. The adage that a mask is a form of liberation was borne out as Mr Harley entered the generous spirit of the nature-loving old man.
I remain deeply suspicious of this kind of show. It tells you as much about the skill of the performers as it does about the nature of the subject; and, although Mr Harley emerged as a thoroughly decent bloke, by the end of the evening I felt he had quite properly kept his inner secrets intact.
· Until May 13. Box office: 020 7452 3000.
