Tuesday, 16 October 2012

Great Expectations @ Darlington Civic

Deeply and darkly delicious

It was a dark night; rain was brooding, the last vestiges of summer had been swept away by the cold north breeze while curtains were pulled tight to keep the night out and the warmth in.  It might sound like the start of a gothic horror but it was actually the weather in Darlington as we ventured to the Civic to watch Jo Clifford's adaptation of the classic Dickens tale, Great Expectations.  It seemed very fitting that it was such a bleak, cold and uninviting night for this tale by London's finest storywriter is not one of fun, love and joy but bitterness, resentment and betrayal and boy, does this version deliver.

I've always loved Great Expectations but I've been regularly disappointed by dramatised adaptations which seemed unwilling or incapable to delve truly into the depths of the darkness which lies beneath the story.  They always wanted to provide a happy ending, lighten the scenes with redemption and benevolence and paint both the main characters (Pip and Estella) as intrinsically happy souls who ride the rough passages before finding everlasting joy and love.  That's not what this story is about and Jo Clifford does a magnificent job in keeping the macabre, soul destroying darkness intact throughout the performance.

Set,in part by a recounting older Mr Pip, the story follows the life of Pip as he progresses from poor urchin to gentleman, from love hopeful to cold and stony hearted realist, from wealthy city toff to poor and cast aside wannabe.  In Taylor Jay-Davies (who played all but the oldest Pip) we had a lead who was able to very convincingly portray Pip from his earliest years, right through adolescence and into early manhood.  Taylor was totally believable in each of his characters' guises, taking the audience through Pip's maturing without any question of doubt that we were watching a young man grow, blossom and then harden to the cruel world around him.

Estella, played by Grace Rowe, was the epitome of stone-hearted - her tutelage by Miss Havisham (played by the delightful Paula Wilcox) into the follies of love and the pursuit and ruination of all men was a delicious foray into the gothic, macabre horror of the soul so often lamented by Byron and Shelly.  Ms Rowe was utterly brilliant; her portrayal of Estella's journey from total acceptance of Miss Havisham's philosophies on love to her own realisation that she has been damaged beyond all repair was played with a sad, sad pathos which at first was the juxtaposition to Pip's blind affections, but soon became the undercurrent for both the lead characters.

Jo Clifford's adaptation doesn't just rely on Pip, Estella and Miss Havisham hold the story, she takes the audience into a world of dark, circus-like horror which catapults the viewers onto an almost surreal and certainly unnerving trip amongst the Dickensian underbelly of life.  Humour is used sparingly, and even then only to accentuate the darkness that follows whilst only Joe Gargery (played by the wonderful Steve North) and Magwitch (played by the uber-talented Chris Ellison) were allowed to hold onto any semblance of goodness.  There was no place for a London friendship for Pip, no place for sentiment from Pip to his sister and certainly no place for any lightening of the mood at the end.

It was great to see so many students in the audience, obviously drawn by the fact that Great Expectations is always heralded as one of Dickens' greatest writings.  What was even more pleasing was that they will have witnessed a version of the story which is the closest to how Dickens wanted his story to be known - it has not the moral ending like Christmas Carol, it is not a rags-to-riches happy ending like Oliver Twist - this has the dark, original ending which left readers feeling so cheated and despondent that he was urged to write an alternative happier ending.


Charles Dickens' Great Expectations, brilliantly adapted by Jo Clifford is on at Darlington Civic until Saturday 20th October.

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