CONTEMPORARY ARTS
THEATRE
The Deep Blue Sea. By Terence Rattigan. (Duchess.) THE trouble with Hester Collyer is irresponsibility, aggravated by inexperience. Almost everything she does is inconsiderate. When the curtain rises she is unconscious. She has attempted suicide, and failed in the attempt. Had she succeeded, the consequences would have been disastrous for her lover, grievous for her husband and extremely inconvenient for her landlady ; besides, of course, being fatal for her. Why did she make this attempt ? Whys throughout this admirable and exciting play, are we aware that she may at almost any moment renew it ? We apprehend, rather than fully under- stand, the reasons. It may be that Mr. Rattigan, sitting down to write a play about one kind of love, really wrote a play about the lack of all other kinds. It may be that Miss Ashcroft, portraying with a most moving brilliance a tortured and uncertain soul, possesses on the stage too many reserves of authority and intelligence to square with either Hester's tactics or her strategy. Or it may be that both author and actress know exactly what they are up to and are both arriving at the same target in reality.
It is a target broadly deli-red by Hester's lover, an ex-fighter ace in decay, when he says : " She was a vicar's daughter. She married the first man who asked her, then fell for the first man who made an eye at her." Elsewhere he says : " We are death to each other " ; and we know that, since they started living together, he has taken to drink, lost his nerve and ruined his career as a test pilot.
Does Hestersee that she is death to Freddie ? She must. Neither love nor pride can blind her to the fact that his casual treatment of her is not mere neglect ; it is evasion. Freddie is a fugitive, shame- faced, conscience-stricken, but deeply, instinctively concerned to protect his own interests, to which Hester is inclement and indeed inimical. Aware of this, her only reaction is to assert, again and again, her right to Freddie, to preserve at all costs the relics of a passion which is destroying them both. It is she, not Freddie, who is the cruel one. Freddie, in his simple, limited way, is at least capable of considering the situation from her point of view, and even from her husband's. Hester can only see it from her own.
This underlying irresponsibility is the only part of the character which Miss Ashcroft, in a most skilful, touching and distinguished performance, fails to bring out ; we never quite believe that this Hester, with her strong character and her clear perceptions, would not restore some sort of order into the chaos she has wrought in the lives of three people. Mr. Roland Culver gives a beautifully restrained performance as her husband, and Mr. Kenneth More hits off with extraordinary precision the muddled integrity and the
raffish, down-at-heels charm of,the war-time hero whose life ended in 1940. Among other good performances I liked Mr. David Aylmer's sententious young prig, but was sorry to see how little this actor had studied the style of hair-cut affected in the junior ranks of the Civil Service.
Mr. Rattigan has written a very fine and enthralling play, which I enjoyed enormously.
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