Bedroom Farce

We went to see Alan Ayckbourn’s Bedroom Farce at The Duke of York’s Theatre in London on Tuesday 11^th May 2010. What rubbish!

The play focuses on four couples in different stages of marriage and takes place in three different bedrooms. This is conceptually an interesting subject and some of the principles are enduring. I accept that the word ‘Farce’ is in the title but this was just slapstick. This play was first staged in 1976 and its presentation may have been appropriate for the time but modern day audiences are more sophisticated and expect a comedy to be clever rather than relying on people falling about. The eight actors had a miserable script to work with and as a result acted poorly. I have seen many school plays with better acting. I am absolutely amazed that Peter Hall agreed to direct it and then that he allowed it to be presented in such an infantile way. Perhaps it improved in the second half but by the time interval arrived we had had enough (as had the people behind us) and we left quickly. The final indignity is that we had paid £50 each for the tickets. This was night time robbery and no way to entice patrons to return.