Review: An Inspector Calls
If dramaturgy is a ‘mode of looking’, then Stephen Daldry’s production of JB Priestley’s An Inspector Calls invites us to look at the house of the Birling family as a gothic dystopia of privileged victorian living. The house on stilts tilts towards its audience with the threat that it may well fall on them. It is a manifestation of the grotesque - potted with the barnacles of laissez-faire capitalism. That this looms behind a curtain is simultaneously absurd and impressive.
We are introduced to Priestley’s world through a street-scene of kids playing in mud pools and drizzling rain. The street recedes satisfyingly to a neighbourhood backdrop grounded in a public realm of heedless neglect. Edna, the housemaid (played by a wonderful Frances Campbell) fantastically sets the tone for the piece. The unrelenting miserable life of the working classes underpinned by a recognisably Presbyterian stoicism: mustn’t grumble lest you wish for something more to grumble about. The oversized Birlings are fleetingly seen through the house windows as they congratulate themselves for baubles that unfalteringly fall into their laps: a knighthood for Lord Mayor Arthur Birling (Jeffrey Harmer), marriage into an influential family for Gerald Croft (Simon Cotton); public influence for Sybil Birling (Christine Kavanagh). The house acts as a verfremdungseffect to the audience as its protective walls initially obscure the riches within. It is utterly repellent and entirely effective. Perhaps too effective…as it paints these admittedly two dimensional people in bawdy two-dimensionality. There need not be any thought on the part of the audience. And the audience have not yet seen the Birling family with their own eyes. Into this setting arrives Inspector Goole (Liam Brennan). He drinks in the scene, much as the audience already has for the past ten minutes, before announcing his arrival to the Birlings. The same V-effekt experienced by the audience plays out between the Birlings and the Inspector as he is addressed through a window-frame. There is a repeatable air about much of this which seems to dampen the pace of the play.
When the house does finally open out, each member of the cast must negotiate a tight spiral staircase. Unadorned, the staircase is visibly satisfying. However, it is dynamically flat when humanly engaged. The inspector carries out his well-known duties rooted in the street-scape - interrogating each member of the Birling family (and Gerald Croft) whilst revealing his cards just sufficiently so. The audience understands full well that this activity takes place within the drawing room opened before them but its details are vague, and as recessed as the neighbourhood in which the house is set. The mise-en-scene is impressive; however, instead of complementing the Birling’s privilege, it has the unintended consequence of setting the house apart so that it is in competition with the actors on stage. This effect is amplified further when the house seems to shake on its tectonic plates spewing its contents onto the stage before the startled Birlings. There is a wonderful scene where, the Inspector gone and the family having retreated back once more within the walls of the house, the Birlings learn there is no Inspector Goole. Each member’s head protrudes sequentially through victorian window frames in a call and response of hysterical laughter. It is a scene which accurately captures the mood Daldry seems to have been searching for throughout the play.
The house is the star in this production. Perhaps it always was. An Inspector Calls was a story of its time. It’s sad to know that we are still living in those times. The hope is that one day we might switch on the news and not hear the echoing sound of the Birling laugh. But for now, the Inspector will keep on calling and we must find new ways of looking. However, a house on stilts comes perilously close to being a house on a hill, and that’s an entirely different story.
An Inspector Calls played at Theatre Royal, Glasgow 23rd-27th May.