It would be fascinating to have stopwatch timings for stage productions. My impression, which I guess only promptbooks could confirm, is that Peter Hall's revival of Harold Pinter's enigmatic play is quicker and less pause-laden than his original 1971 production. But even if this new version seems lighter and faster, it still precisely conveys the primal battle being conducted under a civilised, bourgeois veneer.
Pinter's play is, in part, about the violating nature of possession. Deeley, a successful documentary-maker, owns the converted coastal farmhouse, nicely realised in Lucy Hall's oak-beamed design, in which the action is set. Neil Pearson's Deeley also treats his wife, Kate, as if she were his emotional and physical property. But, with the arrival of Kate's old chum Anna, we witness a fierce contest between husband and friend which eventually negates the idea of ownership and implies that Kate retains her uncolonised independence.
Watching Hall's production, I was reminded of how skilfully Pinter exploits and compresses the traditional triangular drama: the difference here is that the conflict is more psychological than sexual and that the battleground is the subjectively remembered past. Pinter's masterstroke is to suggest that Kate, over whom Deeley and Anna are fighting, is the one in control of the situation. And Janie Dee, as watchful and mysterious as a cat curled up on a chaise longue, is the seductive pivot of this production. She even brilliantly suggests there is a touch of feline cruelty in Kate who finally plays with her would-be possessors as if they were her victims.
What Hall's production conveys admirably is the sense that we are watching a drawing-room drama that deals with the classic Pinter themes of time, memory and the need for resistance to occupying forces.
