A Passage to India at Park Theatre London – Review

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A Passage to IndiaAs a British person, I am meant to be ashamed by the UK’s colonial past. And in some ways, I can understand that. Certain regressive laws introduced during the days of ‘the empire on which the sun never set’ are still in place in some of the former colonies, and let’s be honest, the colonial power often abused their position and the local populace. To get an idea of how things were, you can head to the Park Theatre to see Simon Dormandy’s adaptation of E. M. Forster’s classic A Passage to India.
In the city of Chandrapore, in British India, there are two very different types of people – The British and the Indians. They exist side by side, working ‘together’ – with the British in the positions of power – but the two races don’t mix outside of working relationships and they definitely don’t socialise. However, Dr Aziz (Asif Khan) doesn’t entirely believe that this is true. He for example has made friends with Cyril Fielding (Richard Goulding) the head of a local British provided college for Indians. Into this part of the empire comes the sprightly Mrs Moore (Liz Crowther) in India to visit her son, the British magistrate Ronny Heaslop (Edward Killingback). Mrs Moore has brought with her Adela Quested (Phoebe Pryce) a naive young schoolmistress who is due to get engaged to Ronny. But first, she is very excited to be on this trip and wants to spend time, not in the company of the British in their exclusive clubs, but meeting real Indians and getting to know the people of the country. Little does she know, that her quest to experience reality is going to be granted and will lead to massive political and personal ramifications for all concerned.
The original 1924 award-winning book, was based on some of E.M. Forster’s own experiences of India in the early part of the 20th century, and doesn’t really paint a good picture of life under British rule there. This does come out quite well in Simon Dormandy’s adaptation and the English characters’ actions can be quite uncomfortable viewing at times – particularly in the opening to the second act in the way they get together to ensure that Dr Aziz receives ‘justice’. However, at two hours twenty, including interval, it does feel that the story takes a rather long time to not get very far. There were quite a few times when I found my attention wandering and trying to decide where the narrative was going. There is quite a large cast, but at times, I did wonder why. There seemed to be a few characters who did very little and could possibly have been amalgamated.
Having said that, there were three characters that were perfectly written and whose stories were a pleasure to watch thanks to first rate performances by their respective actors. These were Asif Khan as Dr Aziz, Richard Goulding as Mr Fielding and, in particular Liz Crowther whe really excels in the role of Mrs Moore. I loved Mrs Moore from the first moment she appeared sticking her head into the mosque and disturbing Dr Aziz as he contemplated his world. There was a lovely feistiness in Liz’s performance which gives a great sense of the vibrancy of Mrs Moore’s character, which works particularly well in her interactions with Dr Aziz. Asif Khan’s performance is nicely stated and takes Dr Aziz from being a nice man, looking for friends to an Empire hating committed Indian looking forward to independance the removal of the British. Similarly, Richard Goulding’s performance as the, to my mind, rather naive and overly hopeful, Fielding, works well as the person that tries desperately to cross the two worlds between India and England.
The production itself was nicely staged and the addition of original music by Kuljit Bhamra really adds a nice sense of authenticity to the proceedings. Co-Directors Simon Dormandy and Sebastian Armes keep things moving well and make good use of their cast to create extra items not provided by Dora Schweitzer’s set – for example an unexpected but very impressive elephant to take Mrs Moore and Miss Quested to the Marabar caves – again created by the cast using sticks and some impressive lighting (including blackouts and matches) from Prema Mehta.
A Passage to India was a bit of a disappointment for me. Whilst the language, cast and overall production is pretty good, I’m afraid the story itself has too many characters that feel superfluous and, despite a very colourful ending, just feels a bit too long. The portrayal of the British Raj – English bad, Indian good – is not really a surprise anymore and overall, the show just didn’t really work for me I’m afraid.
3 Star Review
Review by Terry Eastham for www.londontheatre1.com

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