Absurdia: A Resounding Tinkle and Gladly Otherwise by N.F. Simpson, The Crimson Hotel by Michael Frayn, Donmar Warehouse, 18 August 2007

I’m not sure we were quite in the mood for a triple-bill of British Absurdist comedies. I’m not sure we’d have been in the mood for these plays even if we had been in a more appropriate mood.

Billed as being a precursor to Pythonesque comedy, the only python-like thing in the 1960s N.F. Simpson material was talk about a neighbours snake. His plays were certainly more English whimsy than European absurdism.

The Michael Frayn was a modern piece, but lesser Frayn in my view.

Great cast; it would probably seem worthwhile watching Peter Capaldi paint the ceiling. Douglas Hodge directed this production – he seems to have a good eye and ear for this sort of stuff. It’s just not really our sort of stuff.

The critics weren’t too sure either:

One thought on “Absurdia: A Resounding Tinkle and Gladly Otherwise by N.F. Simpson, The Crimson Hotel by Michael Frayn, Donmar Warehouse, 18 August 2007”

  1. I know this is light years after your comment (for which thanks!), but re-reading N.F.Simpson’s masterly ‘Resounding Tinkle’ during the coronavirus outbreak intensified the sense of horror which lies not far under the surface. There’s surely much more to it than “English whimsy” – rather, reading it today I had the continual sense of the ground about to open beneath the Paradocks’ (and everyone else’s) feet, faced with a bureaucracy speaking mad logic to a populace which can only hang on in there. All the best

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