5 STARS, July 25-28. A brilliant evening of riveting theatre; thought-provoking, witty and beautifully staged in a stunning landscape, says Janice Windle
The talented Guildburys have created another great evening of Picnic Theatre in the beautiful setting of Waverley Abbey House this weekend. As director Jay Orbaum told me, this is not a historical drama, it’s a play about all the big questions that are concerning us today as much they as ever did in the past. Bullying, insults, extortion of confessions through fear and betrayal of trust, all are timeless techniques employed by the powerful in a society divided by inequality. The politics of gender, money, power and religion were equally responsible for the severing of Anne Boleyn’s head from her body, as the sword that cut through that “little neck”.
Sarah Gibbons is a beautiful, charismatic Anne who develops from a wilful teenager of nineteen into a focussed young woman who prizes her own honesty and perseverance above all, holding her own among the bullying men who rule Henry VIII’s court. Her cowed and fearful female friends betray her despite their love for her.
As one of Anne’s destroyers remarks, “It was her eyes… looked straight at you and she wasn’t scared. What man can resist that?” Yet throughout the play, Anne is reviled as a whore by the men around her, whatever their status or religious belief. Tyndale himself calls her “the King’s thing” and, despite learning some respect for her and using her help, fails to support her.
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Paul Baverstock as Thomas Cromwell is the outright villain of the piece: his manner ranges from obsequious to threatening to smoothly persuasive and he’s full of cynical aphorisms; his spider-like black-clad figure dominates the stage as he orchestrates Anne’s destruction. As he says, the final nail in Anne’s coffin was greed and lust: his and Henry’s greed for the money from the dissolution of Catholic monasteries and Henry’s passing lust for the young flesh of Jane Grey.
And a joker in the pack is watching the drama: King James I has brought Anne’s spirit to life as he ponders England’s still divided society, a hundred years after her death. Tim Brown as James is funny, scarily unpredictable, prone to wild excesses, gay, intellectual. Of course, he is as autocratic as Henry. He, too, calls her “whore” and “witch”. Little has changed. But does he intend to use his autocratic power in a way that will bring the country together? Has Anne’s attempt to promote Protestantism changed the balance of power in religion? Did James’s English translation of the Bible based on all the disputing factions in the English church heal the rifts he (and Anne before him) saw in British society?
As Anne says, the “demons of the past” wouldn’t recognise the minds that we, “demons of the future”, bring to the questions the play asks. And Howard Brenton doesn’t pretend to offer answers, other than Anne’s simple prayer for kindness.
At Merrist Wood, Guildford, 25th – 28th July, 8 pm. Tickets: guildburys.com
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