Sometimes events in the news can cast a new light on what’s happening on the stage. Patrick Marber’s production of David Ives’s Venus in Fur, a dark sexual comedy about an actress auditioning for a role with a misogynistic male director, has become depressingly timely as allegations of sexual assault by the disgraced Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein, once referred to as “God”, continue to surface.
Game of Thrones star Natalie Dormer gives a mesmerising performance as Vanda Jordan – skilfully seductive and with impeccable comedic timing – as she crashes into an audition with young jaded playwright/director Thomas Novachek (David Oakes), who is adapting the 19th-century sadomasochistic novel Venus in Furs for the New York stage. Although she initially appears ill-suited for the part, swearing like a sailor and cackling at her own lewd comments, as soon as she dons a ladylike white gown Dormer transforms, like a BDSM Eliza Doolittle, into the aristocratic, haughty lead the playwright is looking for.
What follows is a battle of wills between the two, with shifts in the power dynamic, role reversal, characters playing characters playing characters, and a variety of amusing transatlantic accents. While Vanda charms both Novachek and the audience, his character is somewhat lost in the background, soon staring at her with the air of a lovesick teenager without putting up much of a fight. As Vanda gains more power over him, she calls out the book’s sexism and their encounter becomes a proxy gender war.
The 90-minute one-act play is an entertaining tour de force, building to a thrillingly camp ending. But there’s no escaping that, for all its forward-thinking gender politics, it’s a man’s play, directed by a man, featuring a skimpily dressed woman arguably satisfying the male protagonist’s sexual desires. It’s a lot harder to laugh along with than it would have been a month ago.
