Lost in cultural transfer
Friday, July 25th, 2008Even big successes in the British and Irish theatre sometimes tend to get lost on their way across the channel. My absolute highlight of last years’s Edinburgh Fringe was Enda Walsh’s „The Walworth Farce“. Whilst the press voiced a few nit-picking reservations, in the Traverse Bar even from colleagues who normally couldn’t agree on the excact colour of their pre-show drinks praise for the play and Mikel Murfi’s breathtakingly fast production was unanimous. I imagined in the German-speaking theatre there would be huge interest, as Walsh’s „Disco Pigs“ up to now has had more than 70 productions over here. However, in the end it went to none of the major theatres but to Berne. Obviously many German dramaturgs had been bewildered by the play within the play which is as intricate as it is absurd and mere „white noise“ for the author.
Normally one associates the Swiss not only with an almost English inability to convert penalties but also an inherent slowness and painstaking cleanliness. Still it came as a shock to enter the auditorium and to see that Walsh’s rundown Walworth Road flat had been turned into a spotless, aseptically white apartment every Docklands rent shark could make a killing with. The three Irishmen acting out the title-giving farce were actors who easily could have been picked up by the better sort of casting agent, not dilettantes rushing through the proceedings in the style of The Three Stooges. Every ludicrous twist was laboriously spelt out what slowed down the pace enormously.
The tyrannical actor-manager Dinny was no psychopath but a representative of the Swiss consensus society who from the outset regretted his violent outbursts and writhed pathetically on the floor. Why his son Blake had to kill this lump of misery remained the only secret in a production even managing to turn the play’s harsh ending into sheer whimsy. Walsh’s decisive final turn when the surviving Sean paints his face brown and assumes the identity of black supermarket checkout-girl Hayley got lost completely, as Hayley was played by a white actress. So a manic Irish farce with a truly heartbreaking ending looked like lame Chekhov for beginners in more than genteel surroundings. Even the occasional singing of „An Irish Lullaby“ was accompanied by mournful piano chords reminiscent of Chopin on Valium. Still, the local press loved it. Poor Walworth Road. Lucky Switzerland.
