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FELIX Friday 19 November 2010
23
The Notting Hill fabrication
ARTS
What do you do when your erotic obsession with your teenage son drives you to self-destruction? Let’s see
Will Prince not so on plot. Whilst there is a narrative
Often I fi nd myself wondering why I
don’t lead the life of a Felliniesque,
care-free socialite, generally whilst
carving the fossilized Crunchy Nut from
my cereal bowl or in those few moments
when confronted by the awful reality of
capacitance problems. And whilst normally
I painfully realize I have neither
an Italian passport nor a bottomless supply
of wealth nor a wardrobe full of dapper
suits and accessories, Affabulazione
indulged me with a glimpse of a dolce-er
vita, served with a very Italian warning
of such a life’s pitfalls.
The play charts the downfall of a
Milanese industrialist who destroys his
wealth, respect and relationships as he
is plagued by a debilitating sexual desire
for his adolescent son. Driven to
vindicative, devious sex with his wife
and infantilisation of his son, we see the
Father, played with gravitas by Jasper
Britton, become ever more determined
to reconcile his emotions with his offspring.
Catalysed by a visit from the
“a strange mixture
of tragedy, parody
and sexual
psychoanalysis,
all dressed in a
distinctively Italian
glamour”
ghost of Sophocles during a fever, the
enigma of his love is equivocally solved
and spirals deeper into madness crippled
by his jealous obsession.
Affabulazione offers a strange mixture
of tragedy, parody and sexual
psychoanalysis, all dressed in a distinctively
Italian glamour. The obligatory
Italian-man-in-crisis-conversationwith-priest
scene is given a perverse
twist, as we see the dirty Father distracted
from the Holy Father as his son
walks back up through the garden of his
Lombardy summerhouse (the setting of
most of the play, commendably simulated
in Notting Hill through the use
of a cicada recording and turning the
heaters up). Depravity is maintained
throughout, but nothing is trivialized.
Even through the slightly bizarre climactic
scene, the play retains a sense of
gravity and the perverse desires of the
‘Father’ are never debased.
That said, the fact that it was at one
time adapted for an opera says a lot
about Affabulazione, big on emotion,
to the piece, the decay of the Father’s
sanity is somewhat clunky and consists
more a series of emotional crescendi,
meaning it is often more enjoyable to
just bathe in the bouts of catharsis than
to track the unraveling of the Father’s
morals and mind.
The role of the ‘Mother’ is arguably
underplayed by Geraldine Alexander,
who it never seemed had quite grasped
the magnitude of her predicament, and
Max Bennett, as the son, strikes a believable
balance between young adult
stallion and subservient teenage son, a
sense of immaturity perhaps springing
from the actor’s own slightly undeveloped
acting technique. Written by Pier
Paolo Pasolini, a man whose exploits
are so broad, that one would think had
he been alive a little longer, he may
have been the fi rst Italian on the Moon,
the play is naturally going to be based
around extraordinary experiences, but
Affabulazione tends at times to wander
outside the realms of the believable.
The intimate nature of the new venue
(basically a converted garage) makes the
play one of the most intense of recent
months and the set, although minimalist,
supports the actors whilst allowing
the fl uency needed by such a fantastical
play.
Due to the extremity of the situation,
I question how much the standard theatregoer
can take from the piece in way
of a moral, but Affabulazione’s delicate
structuring of a man’s desires consuming
him makes for a high-tempo, enthralling
spectacle. Not to mention the
fact that it’s cheaper than a weekend
break in Pisa.
FABRICATION (AFFABULAZIONE),
until 4th Decmber at The Print
Room, Notting Hill, £12/£16