Look Back in Anger Royal Exchange, Manchester.
The opening image gives us Jimmy Porter in a rich red glow, trumpet aloft: in the background Thelonius Monk, a Bohemian and slightly dangerous image, instantly recognisable to anyone who ever possessed one of those seminal Blue Note recordings. And this production nicely retains that slightly seedy 50s jazz-club ambiance throughout; all that smoking!
The setting is tattily naturalistic with steaming irons, lit stoves, moquette armchairs, boxes of Lux, in which the continuous “fourth wall” - the outside wall of the bed-sit - is sliced off just above floor level like one of those cutaway drawings in The Eagle that aficionados of fifties style will also recognise.
The effect, like so much naturalism in-the-round, is of a slightly forced intimacy, which, during Jimmy’s more intense outbursts, becomes positively voyeuristic. One’s eyes keep straying to the well-lit legs of the gentleman in the front row with his feet almost in the fireplace. There are some enjoyably uncomfortable moments - the Saturday matinee audience groaning audibly at Jimmy’s less “politically correct” outbursts. Mr Osborne would have loved it.
The world of Jimmy, Cliff and Alison is, however, captured effectively. These people read books, and talks about socialism; if there were no “big ideas“left by 1956, one wonders how JP would find the postmodern nineties.
This Jimmy Porter, Bohemian and slightly dangerous himself, (and perhaps just a little too hip with his very 90s haircut?) is suitably intense and Angst-ridden. Michael Sheen gives the character a sharp-featured, prowling presence with a slightly manic edge, part Chet Baker, part Rik Mayall.
When Jimmy and his long-suffering Alison, (presented here with touching fragility by Claire Skinner) are finally re-united in self-pity, the ambiguity provides proof that the play has retained some of the edge which caused such a stir 40 years ago.
Until February 25. Box office: 061 833 9833. Running time 2 hrs 45 mins.