As part of our Surrey in Edinburgh series we sent one of our most experienced theatre reviewers up to the Fringe to see what's going on. The Verge of Strife just wasn't quite good enough for Amanda Hodges in this 2.5 STAR review
High hopes were held for this play, billed as a ’dynamic, moving portrait of a flawed genius.’ First World War poet Rupert Brooke is certainly the ideal subject for a stage show, ‘a young Apollo, golden-haired’ as his friend Frances Cornford described him; he cast a hypnotic impression over almost everyone who met him, his combination of stunning looks and mesmerising poetic ability usually proving irresistible.
Jonny Labey, fresh from Eastenders, plays Brooke. He looks suitably appealing for sure, has all the charm and buoyant confidence that one can imagine emanating from Brooke and yet it just doesn’t work as it should. All is too clichéd, too dramatically underwhelming, the audience being informed of Brooke’s genius and magnetism without being allowed to see it unfold in context. Labey’s Brooke is ‘presented’ to us rather than evolving naturally as a character, and this undermines conviction – it may well be partially the responsibility of the script too. We see Brooke as a tortured narcissist here, constantly forming emotional attachments that he never fulfils and struggling to find a strong sense of self. The female roles in this production are slightly more convincing but the whole show needs restructuring in order to gain the ‘dynamism’ that would have carried it to success.
Brooke may well have traded rather shamelessly on his romantic appeal but he had real ability as his poem ‘The Soldier’ so memorably evokes, presciently looking ahead to a time when ‘a corner of a foreign field’ might house his last remains. The poem inspiring the show’s title spoke of a man ‘magnificently unprepared/For the long littleness of life’ and this aspect the production does indeed convey effectively but it’s very frustrating to see something clearly well-researched and well-meant that could, with more energy and invention, have become a compelling piece of stage biography.
Verge of Strife is at the Assembly George Square Studios 2 from 2.15pm daily until August 29. For tickets visit edfringe.com or call 0131 623 3030
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