The Collaboration - kind of Marvellous really.

4.5/5

Yes, yes, alright, I’m late to the party on this one - I have my reasons (covid, baby, trying to earn a living while the world around me inevitably begins its collapse into the apocalypse. Normal weekday…) - but when one leaves the theatre feeling quite this impassioned, it would seem a waste to not use the euphoria to kick off the blog again.

Aaannnnnyway. The Collaboration.

I’ll start by saying that, for someone with ADHD who struggles to stay focused and who also happens to be an actor and therefore usually spends most of their time watching a show picking up on technical aspects, approach to characterisation, stage technique and the like, The Collaboration was somewhat of a spellbinding experience.

Perhaps drawing on a recent trend in immersive theatre events such as Secret Cinema and the long-running Immersive Gatsby experience, this piece drags you in from the moment you enter the theatre. You’re right back in the 1980s, surrounded by examples of Warhol and Besquiat‘s work, immersed in music of the age, even having the shows light tech dressed the part (they and the front of house staff happily boogieing along to the soundtrack of retro hits).

I’m already stoked at this point, and I haven’t even got to my seat and done my usual panicked routine of stashing my coat and bag beneath the seat, then apologising to everyone sitting around me for my anxious kerfuffle before beginning to nurse my choice of tipple for the first half - though on this occasion I attended alone so booked an aisle seat ‘cause, y’know, plague. Smart me.

I was fascinated by the concept of this show and intrigued by a part of Warhol’s life I knew nothing about (most of it, to be fair), but little me has been in awe of Paul Bettany as an actor since way back in the 2001 film A Knights Tale and so, I’m not going to lie here, there was a small prompt in my booking this particular show in order to see him on stage rather than on a (albeit these days usually large cinema) screen.

I want to say I wasn’t disappointed, but that downplays the brilliance of this piece and its execution and suggests I was awed by Bettany’s presence or the fact they managed to get a Marvel deity into a London theatre. I wasn’t disappointed. And I was awed. But awed more by the fact that I found myself completely and utterly engulfed by the story, the characters. I didn’t want it to end (as mentioned, a rarity for me). Both Bettany and Pope showed supreme commitment in their character prep. The physicality Bettany demonstrated in his encapsulation of Warhol was hypnotising, to the point that you literally forget who you’re watching. A case in point: the woman next to me hadn’t actually figured out who it was and was startled when I told her. I mean, yeah the wig helped but really…almost unrecognisable through his transformation of character.

I don’t know enough of either Basquiat or Jeremy Pope to make a similar comparison (though I’ll be making a conscious effort to rectify that in the case of the latter, for sure). That said, the balance, the antithesis, the wonderful awkwardness but at the same time total nonchalance in Warhol‘s presence is evident and kind of delicious to watch, if uncomfortable at times. Which is not to say that is a bad thing. If anything, it could be said that this piece glosses over both the impact of homophobia at the time and the dichotomous nature of the lives of the two men and the worlds they both come from and live in a little too much: The racism of the 1980s was heavily implied and even - at points - outright *stated* but this show does miss an opportunity to needle that point and spark further conversation around it. It could be that Anthony McCarten deliberately wanted to avoid making a political statement with that: fair reasoning, but given the ongoing, ugly face of racism across the globe today it would have been a welcome touch. After all, if art isn’t political...?

A final point for Pope here. For an actor to be able to reproduce a filmed acting sequence in close up with such absolute precision - down to the exact timing of a slight glance to the floor with just the eyes - whilst maintaining such a seemingly tight connection to the emotional journey of the character is seriously. f*******. impressive. I’m here for emotional connection an’ all, but this extraordinary demonstration of technique needs a mention so much so that I felt it warranted a paragraph all of its own.

You *would* have been able to catch The Collaboration at the Young Vic until April 2 2022, except that I’ve taken forever to get this review up, and also apparently one of the cast caught the ‘rona towards the end and they cut the last few performances soooo… (Speedy recovery, whomsoever it was!)

Production image © Marc Brenner

https://www.youngvic.org/whats-on/the-collaboration