NATHAN THE WISE. To 15 October 2005.

London

NATHAN THE WISE
by Gotthold Lessing translated by Edward Kemp

Hampstead Theatre To 15 October 2005
Mon-Sat 7.30pm Mat Sat 3pm
Audio-described 13 Oct
Captioned 10 Oct
Post-show discussion 4 Oct
Runs 2hr 40min One interval

TICKETS: 020 7722 9301
www.hampsteadtheatre.com
Review: Timothy Ramsden 21 September

Good old reliable Nathan sets all right.
This 1779 drama is by a writer who penned the earliest German plays to have a toehold in today's repertoire and created German theatre criticism. Talk about having your cake and eating it. Sensibly shorn by Edward Kemp, this second major production in 2 years (Kemp's version premiered at Chichester's Minerva Theatre in 2003) reveals a wisdom impressive today Nathan's story of the 3 rings as an argument for religious tolerance remains remarkable but astonishing for 18th century Europe, even mid-Enlightenment.

Nathan, much-travelled merchant and model of generosity (with cash and in spirit), has a nobility of soul over-riding any suggestion that being Wise' is code for cleverly amassing wealth. Those who don't know him suggest it; those who do brush it off. Indeed, he can't give money away, however hard he tries with the debt-ridden Saladin or a Christian monastic.

Nathan prospers in Jew-hating Crusader Jerusalem, its church uneasily at peace with Muslim warrior-leader Saladin. It's the Christians who cause Nathan trouble, both a Templar knight, increasingly confused as Nathan subverts all his prejudices, and the Patriarch, a feeble ancient figure and the only person never to meet Nathan.

At the Minerva Michael Feast was unlikely (yet successful) casting, a lithe, quick-minded man. Michael Pennington, differently successful, could be anyone's first thought for Nathan, an actor whose every word seems excavated from reflective consciousness. Older and more deliberate in manner, Pennington is still water running deep to Feast's fizzing fountain.

Anna Carteret sculpts patient love and fond frustration out of Nathan's wife and Vincent Ebrahim is a strong, sagacious Saladin. Justin Awoth's youthful, reluctant Treasurer has a neat comic edge, but it's cruel to expect Awoth to double as the cement-stiff minded old Patriarch. Sam Troughton seems easier with his character as angry young man than as Christian enforcer, but the playing overall's good. Patrick Connellan's set of rising plank-panels provides a sense of home areas protected from a mysterious outside. If Anthony Clark's production doesn't quite avoid the sense of a comic Moliere-type knot-tying conclusion it has the play's measure overall, creating key moments of quiet intensity throughout.

Nathan: Michael Pennington
Daya: Anna Carteret
Rachel: Celia Meiras
Al Hafi/The Patriarch: Justin Awoth
The Templar: Sam Troughton
The Lay Brother:
Saladin: Vincent Ibrahim
Sittah: Shelley King

Director: Anthony Clark
Designer: Patrick Connellan
Lighting: James Farncombe
Sound: Steven Brown
Assistant director: Dan Ayling

2005-09-22 11:26:43