Dickie Beau as Oscar Wilder and Simon Russell Beale as A E Housman_credit Helen MurrayOpening with the great man’s death (Simon Russell-Beale on superlative, intellectually combative form) and in keeping with the play’s heady assortment of suitably classical references, Housman stands at the edge of the river Styx, contemplating his life, awaiting the ferry to his final destination. Thereafter follows a robust and comical exchange with the hooded Charon (Alan Williams) in which they discuss who is top of Housman’s list of who-to-meet-and-get-to-know during his time in the Underworld. It sets the tone for much of the next, nearly three hours running time (including interval).
An assortment of individuals from the celebrated classical scholar’s life, flit in and out as they paint a picture of the man and the times in which he lived. These include the athletic Moses Jackson (Ben Lloyd-Hughes) a close friend but for Housman, also the object of his burning but unrequited love — as a modern Theseus and Pirithous may have been.
Essentially a gargantuan talking shop, the play lands broad strokes, but delivers them gently, occasionally rumbustiously, in the form of a series of sensitively observed vignettes. The older Housman even gets to address and learn from his younger self (Matthew Tennyson) as they discuss poetry, the classics and the relative merits and shortcoming of various translations. They idolise or disparage those Latin and Greek scholars who have previously undertaken such noble work and assert their belief of its vital importance as a science.
The Victorian era underpins the play through acknowledgement of the societal mores of the period. Stoppard introduces encounters with among others, Oscar Wilde (Dickie Beau) whose tearful yet caustic refusal to accept Housman’s melancholic empathising, imbues a refreshing antidote to the latter’s wistful postulations and sombre reflections. That aside, the piece is crammed to the rafters with wit and playful intellectualising. Its dialogue is peppered with examples of ipse dixit along with a plethora of Greek and Latin extracts which the cast race through, illuminating translation options for the rusty and uninitiated in the audience, as they go. This includes much of Housman’s own translation of Horace’s Diffugere Nives.
The sheer scale of some passages evidently caught-out certain cast members whose familiarity with the text was not always as mellifluous as they may have wanted, but their efforts will undoubtedly bed-in during the course of the run and they should console themselves with the fact that Simon Russell Beale is the undisputed master in this realm and sets an extraordinarily high bench march to live up to. On the whole it was a terrific effort.
The cast:
A E HOUSMAN - Simon Russell Beale
HOUSMAN - Matthew Tennyson
OSCAR WILDE - Dickie Beau
JOWETT/LABOUCHÈRE - Stephen Boxer
JACKSON - Ben Lloyd-Hughes
POLLARD - Seamus Dillane
PATER/HARRIS - Jonnie Broadbent
RUSKIN/STEAD/JEROME - Dominic Rowan
CHARON - Alan Williams
CHAMBERLAIN/ELLIS - Michael Marcus
KATHARINE HOUSMAN - Florence Dobson
PATTISON/POSTGATE - Peter Landi
The production runs until 1st February 2025.
