Writer: Martin Crimp
Director: Sam Smithson
Martin Crimp’s Attempts on Her Life, which first premiered at the Royal Court in 1997, comes up as fresh as paint in this production by Not Quite Ready Productions. Imaginatively directed by Sam Smithson, it’s fast-paced, enigmatic, funny and thought-provoking.
Crimp’s uniquely structured play consists of 17 scenes, which seem to have little or no connection. But running through them is a thread of mysterious references to an absent character, Anne. Crimp, determined to deconstruct the very nature of what a play is, does not specify how many actors are needed to perform his work, or who should speak which lines. In this production, there are four people on stage, who sometimes play actors with scripts and at others, turn into scriptwriters, brainstorming ideas for a scene. At still other times, they themselves become characters. But never Anne. She is present only in her absence.
The play opens with a series of time-stamped messages on an ansaphone. A man – a lover? – calls from Prague. Or is it Vienna? He can’t quite remember, ringing off as another call is coming in. There are calls from Anne’s mother, with her surly husband in the background reaffirming they’re not giving Anne any more money. Has she run away? Or has something more sinister happened?
Later scenes make reference to mental health problems. But if we’re too keen to join up the dots and diagnose suicidal thoughts, we then have to make sense of other, completely different ‘attempts’ on Anne. At one point, she seems to be a terrorist. At another, a murderer. When we meet the parents in the flesh in a later scene, they are comically laid back, refusing to be shocked by anything, despite their tale of Anne’s phenomenal globe-trotting.
There’s a very entertaining scene set somewhere in America in the great outdoors – the production makes use of spectacular video sequences by designer Beril Yavuz. A good-natured all-American mom talks about the return of her long-lost son. He’s brought his two small children to meet her, together with his beautiful wife. Long-legged, blonde, articulate, she seems the model of American womanhood. But as our middle-aged character uncritically repeats the views of this new daughter-in-law, we realise we are listening to an increasingly unacceptable stream of ultra-right-wing prejudice. What makes this bizarrely funny is the inversion of our expectations.
A rich soundscape designed by Wil Pritchard, which includes original music and a pleasing variety of sounds, takes us swiftly between scenes. Words and images often recur, suggesting unexplained patterns. For the most part, Attempts on Her Life hasn’t dated. The exception is a scene in which three pompous art pundits discuss a challenging new conceptual artwork. The characterisation is undoubtedly funny, and the actors embody the parts of white, middle-class critics brilliantly. But it’s all rather old-fashioned, like a skit from Not the Nine O’Clock News of the early 80s. The very end of the play, too, feels unnecessarily contrived.
Parts are played by the versatile members of the ensemble: Bethany Monk-Lane, Cameron Wilson, Meghan Bartual Smyth and Tom Terry, all of whom are endlessly watchable.
Runs until 14 June 2025
