Review: The School for Scandal

“There’s no possibility of being witty without a little ill nature.” So speaks Lady Sneerwell, one of a small coven of gossips and slanderers in Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s waspish comedy of manners.

In this handsome, witty and inventive co-production between Shakespeare at the Tobacco Factory and Tobacco Factory Theatres, she is proved to be only half right. For sure, there’s plenty of fun to be had at the expense of others – but that’s only a part of the effervescent sense of comedy running throughout.

Lady S. (Julia Hills) and Joseph Surface (Paapa Essiedu) are the conniving forces that start the School for Scandal’s engine. She is a society widow with designs on Joseph’s dissolute younger brother Charles; Joseph, for his part, also wants to tear Charles away from his current attachment, albeit for his own rather more venal reasons.

And so the two hatch a plan to further discredit Charles with the help of the odious, oleaginous society gossip and tu’penny hack Snake (Paul Currier). They haven’t reckoned, though, with some powerful forces for good among their gossiping Kensington set – not to mention some strong characters who won’t let their judgments be swayed by a bit of idle prattle.

If this were merely a simple triumph of good over evil, though, it wouldn’t have survived in the repertoire as long as it has. In fact, there’s some crisp social commentary in The School for Scandal. And director Andrew Hilton’s genius has been to flag up the similarities between the gossip and slander of 1770s London and the acres of vacuous chatter spawned by its modern counterparts – social media and the gossip press.

These parallels are made abundantly clear, and in a very vivid shade of pink, right from the start. SATTF regular Byron Mondahl gives us a hilarious and very animated prologue composed by Associate Director Dominic Power, driving home how over-theatrical mannerisms, camp sensationalism and an intense need to be near their source (drawing room; iPhone) have united gossipers across the centuries. Throughout the play, this fascinated prurience towards others’ private lives, and the wildfire speed at which gossip spreads, feel all too familiar.

As ever with SATTF, there are beautifully judged performances across the board. Chris Bianchi is on typically brilliant form as Sir Peter Teazle, the pompous but good-hearted fiftysomething who finds life with his flighty, materialistic young wife (Daisy Whalley) to be more than he bargained for. Sir Peter frequently stumbles over his own pomposity and pronouncements – and yet, there is a touching emotion beneath all the stuffy gravitas, as he clearly loves his young wife as much as he is bewildered by her.

Elsewhere, Chris Garner brings a splendid directness to Sir Oliver, Joseph and Charles’ long-lost uncle who has returned from his wanderings in the East Indies to cast a critical eye over his two young nephews; Jack Wharrier is a crisp, comic delight as Charles, frittering his uncle’s money away in wine and gambling but clearly a decent, honourable soul; and Julia Hills’ Lady Sneerwell has just the right mix of hauteur and guilty prurience – and of calculation and, as her plan begins to undo, desperation.

Towards the end the plot’s tight coils unravel with the precision and ingenuity of a Feydeau farce or a Wodehouse short story. There may be a little less interpretive vision needed here than in SATTF’s Shakespeare outings – there’s a sense that the language and characters are already so vivid upon the page, that less work is needing in rendering them for modern audiences – but Hilton and his cast and crew have judged their parallels perfectly. It’s hard to imagine Sheridan’s witty, waspish script being given any more life and energy than this.

The School for Scandal continues at the Factory Theatre until Saturday, May 9. For more info and to book tickets, visit www.tobaccofactorytheatres.com/shows/detail/the_school_for_scandal

Pics: Mark Douet