Not top drawer Fugard, this, but Janie and I are/were partial to Athol Fugard’s work and partial to The Orange Tree. This was to be the premier of a new Fugard play at one of our favourite places. What could there be not to like? We weren’t disappointed.
The cast: Peter Gale, Ben Warwick, Chad Shepherd and Leah Muller were all excellent. Auriol Smith directed this one well.
I think we went to see this just after press night.
Nicholas de Jongh liked it:
Tiger de Jongh Standard 23 Oct 2000 Evening Standard (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
Dominic Cavendish found Fugard’s “self rite of passage” theme a bit smug, yet still he really liked it:
Tiger Cavendish Telegraph 24 Oct 2000 The Daily Telegraph (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
Unusually, The Guardian didn’t cover this one. How are Janie and I supposed to know what to think about this sort of play unless our friend, Michael Billington, tells us?
Seriously, we pretty much agreed with the above two reviews. It felt a little self-indulgent but we could forgive Athol Fugard some self-indulgence as he has entertained us so much and did so again in this piece.
No doubt we ate at Don Fernando and no doubt the waiters asked after The Duchess, as was their wont back then when Janie and I went to Richmond without her.