“Fans of Ken Campbell and those knowledgeable about his work will enjoy this show”
Entering the auditorium at The Bunker you are transported into a 70s time warp thanks to Tim Shortall’s clever set design. The space is decorated with a garish orange shag pile carpet and a mismatch of seating including battered sofas and wicker chairs. Choose your seat carefully, making sure it’s comfortable for the 90 minute ride that is about to follow. Frilled flock lampshades adorn the ceiling, piles of scatter cushions invite the audience to kick off their shoes and relax, burning incense dotted around the room completes the look and rewinds you back to the 1970s.
Terry Johnson, the writer, plays himself and takes you on a journey which is part play, part tribute to, part audience with and part eulogy. The tales are about the real life maverick Ken Campbell and how a chance phone call impacted on Terry’s life and future path. Terry delivers most of his lines from a lectern centre stage and admits that not all of the stories and anecdotes are “entirely true”. He hints that the most unlikely of stories are the ones that are actually based on true events. Terry reads his lines from a script in a monotone voice that lacks enthusiasm. It is only when he steps away from the lectern and seems to ad lib that his story comes to life and you can see the passion and respect he had for Ken.
Jeremy Stockwell plays the maverick Ken Campbell. He is the polar opposite of Terry – jumping around the stage with a hyperactive, manic energy that you can imagine was difficult to squash and even more difficult to work with. He plays the part well and is able to switch roles with a remarkable ease.
Fans of Ken Campbell and those knowledgeable about his work will enjoy this show, as many in the audience certainly did. Those who aren’t may find some of the stories uncomfortable to listen to, especially in the current climate with revelations of inappropriate behaviour within the entertainment industry making front page headlines.
“Johnson embodies Marilyn’s vivacity, fragility and bravery in a way that is delightful and ultimately heartbreaking”
This production of Terry Johnson’s play is beautifully suited to the intimacy of the Arcola. The action takes place in a hotel room during the course of one night. The four characters are unnamed, they are the Professor, the Actress, the Ball Player and the Senator but we know who they are, as they are iconic; Einstein, Marilyn Monroe, Joe DiMaggio and Senator Joe McCarthy. I wish the conversations between Einstein and Monroe had really taken place but, although they almost certainly did not, can we be sure of that?
The plausibility of the events and their unlikelihood combine in a delicious uncertainty that is mirrored in conversations about relativity, Heisenberg and Schrödinger’s cat. If this all sounds a bit heavy please don’t be put off, this is a very funny play. If you can imagine Marilyn Monroe explaining relativity to Einstein, using a toy car, some torches and two toy trains, you can see the wonderful absurd genius of Johnson’s work. Both Monroe, played by Alice Bailey Johnson and and Simon Rouse’s Einstein are magnificent. Johnson embodies Marilyn’s vivacity, fragility and bravery in a way that is delightful and ultimately heartbreaking. Rouse’s Einstein is like a much loved and very clever uncle, who takes the extraordinary night in his stride. The relationship that develops between the two is touching and believable. The real Marilyn was widely read, and certainly not a dumb blond. Her notebooks include musings about many topics, including the renaissance and recipes for stuffing mix. Marilyn was an invention and here we see glimpses of what the real woman may have been like. I would love her to have chatted to Einstein but, despite rumours that they had an affair, they probably did not even meet.
Marilyn is not the first visitor to Einstein’s Manhattan hotel room that night. That is Senator McCarthy, played with menace and increasing vitriol by Tom Mannion. He wants to ensure Einstein’s attendance at the Un-American Affairs Committee in the morning, but Einstein is not to be bullied. The next visitor is Marilyn, coming straight from filming the famous skirt over the hot air vent scene from ‘The Seven Year Itch.’ And then her husband, Joe DiMaggio, arrives. He is full of jealousy and suspicion, furious about the scene Marilyn has just filmed, which was watched by thousands of men. He has no idea how to handle his clever, damaged wife. Oliver Hembrough’s gum chewing DiMaggio gets affirmation from finding his picture on baseball cards, and blusters and postures in a way that is both infuriating yet somehow touching in his inability to understand.
This is a play about fame and politics, about surviving and making choices. There is sadness and doubt in everyone but especially McCarthy, who grows more brutish as the night wears on. Marilyn says that she has ‘more than I dreamed of and nothing I want,’ her fragility is haunting. Einstein is shadowed with guilt because of the contribution his work made to the development of the atom bomb. DiMaggio truly loves his wife but has no idea how to keep her. There is no neat resolution here, but the themes of the play have relevance to current political concerns in the States and the treatment of women in Hollywood today. This is a timely revival of Johnson’s play and well worth seeing.
