Talking Heads at the Bridge Theatre review: A pure injection of top-notch acting talent from Kristin Scott Thomas and co

1/10
Nick Curtis @nickcurtis11 September 2020

Alan Bennett’s Talking Heads monologues are distilled shots of drama. You can see the fine actors assembled for this socially distanced season savouring them . These are works rooted in everyday life, that rely on the slow realisation of betrayal or failure. They’re laced with Bennett’s delicate wit but the overall impact is brutal.

Last night, Kristin Scott Thomas gave a tightly wound, beautifully nuanced performance as Celia, an outplayed antiques dealer, in The Hand Of God. Rochenda Sandall — breakout star of the last series of Line Of Duty — was riveting as a woman denying her suspicions about her husband’s nocturnal walks in The Outside Dog, a script inspired by the Yorkshire Ripper case.

On Tuesday we had Monica Dolan in The Shrine as another betrayed spouse, discovering that her biker husband died with his leathers undone. And a delightfully acid Lesley Manville, taking on the part first played by Maggie Smith in 1988, as a vicar’s wife seeking solace in booze, and sex with an Indian shopkeeper in Bed Among The Lentils.

Although the form is confessional, the characters don’t know themselves. The lofty disdain of Manville’s Susan for her husband’s job and his “fan club” of female parishioners dissolves as she tells us she has yet again “run out” of sherry or fallen down the altar steps. The brittle smile and catty comments of Scott Thomas’s Celia mask a yawning void in her soul. Dolan’s Lorna, at least, is afforded a quiet dignity.

Lesley Manville in Bed Among The Lentils
PA

Talking Heads started out on telly: two seasons of six scripts in 1988 and 1998, featuring Smith, Thora Hird, Julie Walters and Bennett himself. The Bridge season uses seven of those original scripts and The Shrine — one of two new ones Bennett gave to the Bridge’s artistic director Nicholas Hytner when he re-filmed the lot for the BBC at the start of lockdown. Still to come are soliloquies by Imelda Staunton, Tamsin Greig, Lucian Msamati and Maxine Peake.

Perfectly suited for the rectangle of the screen, these monologues quickly proved popular on stage and as audition pieces. Quite right too: they are grandstanding, virtuoso showcases. But seeing them together you notice the recurring “he-said-I-said-he-said-I-said” tic in the scripts. Frankly, you miss dialogue.

It’s heroic that Hytner, his fellow directors, and the stars involved, have put these shows on in the face of Covid restrictions and government inaction. Talking Heads gives us a pure injection of Bennett’s voice and top-notch acting talent. But London theatregoers can’t live by monologues alone.

Performances in rep until October 31: 0333 320 0051, bridgetheatre.co.uk

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