Writer: Henrik Ibsen, adapted by Thomas Ostermeier and Florian Brochmeyer
English translation: Duncan Macmillan
Director: Thomas Ostermeier
How, and indeed whether, truth and politics mix is the theme of Henrik Ibsen’s 1882 play An Enemy of the People, a satire in which a small town wrestles with the thought that the spa waters that provide the bulk of the local economy might be contaminated.
Thomas Ostermeier’s adaptation, originally for the Schaubüne Berlin, moves the action to the present day, casting Matt Smith as Thomas Stockmann, an idealistic doctor who, in his role as the town bath’s medical officer, has discovered the bacterial contamination. Initially, he receives backing from his friend Hovstad (Shubham Saraf), the editor of the local newspaper who is interested in publishing Thomas’s findings. But Thomas receives pushback from his brother Peter, who is both the town mayor and head of the baths. To publish would force the town’s hand: they would have to institute remedial works costing £100 million, forcing the baths to close for two years.
So begins an ideological tug-of-war between the siblings that exemplifies how power, and the wielding of it, changes people. As Paul Hilton’s Peter stands up to his brother, both Hovstad and his publisher Aslaksen (Priyanka Burford) withdraw their backing for Thomas’s claims, which only pushes the doctor into a more strident position.
There are many contemporary touch points in modern political life that this adaptation brings to mind. From the blasé attitudes to pollution and climate change in which politicians hem and haw because to take decisive action would be unpopular with the electorate, to the way in which the people with power also control the media, gaslighting the public to believe that dissenting voices are dangerous, Ibsen’s scenario continues to ring true.
The question is whether this contemporary setting helps or hinders such parallels from coming to the fore. The true answer is a bit of both. While some trappings are cosmetic (Act I’s opening dinner party becomes a band practice, for example), the crucial town hall sequence in which Thomas’s warnings evolve into a manifesto for systemic change pivots here into an open mic session in which audience members are invited to chime in.
Quite how many of the audience participants are plants by the production will no doubt be debated; there are clearly some, in order to keep the play on track. More interesting, though, is how Burford’s Aslaksen, moderating the debate but with an eye on preserving the dominance of her own stance, continually reframes each response to always paint Thomas as an unhinged aggressor. That portion of the play, even as it decries the notion of nuance, is far more infused with subtleties than Smith’s own speech in which he accuses the “liberal majority” of being stupid and always wrong.
For his part, Smith is much more interesting when quietly seething with righteous anger than when exploding with oratory. Early on in the play, Thomas’s baby with wife Katharina (an underutilised Jessica Brown Findlay) is described as having his fists perpetually clenched: this is a trait the son has, one feels, inherited from his father.
Zachary Hunt and Nigel Lindsay provide solid, and often comic, support, but it is Hilton’s Peter who dominates here. Unctuous and slithering where his brother is forthright and open, Hilton conveys the epitome of a career politician whose motives remain ambiguous. Whether he is more interested in retaining power or preserving the town at the expense of sacrificing the truth is unreadable in a face which suggests that both (or neither) may be true.
Jan Pappelbaum’s chalkboard set is perhaps the least effective element of the whole production, particularly when, at the tail end of Act I, some literal whitewash is added as the newspaper staff decide not to back Doctor Stockmann’s findings. But within it plays a satire that still retains some bite. Whether it will leave puncture marks is another matter: the liberal majority has a tendency to believe anything if it’s printed on the side of a bus, to favour tax cuts now over investment for future security. Having our failings pointed out to us from a theatre stage tends not to work.
But that is part of the point of Ostermeier’s timely production. This is Ibsen’s world – but it’s us who are living in it.
Continues until 13 April 2024
The Reviews Hub Score
Timely adaptation
