The Libertine| a Curtainup Review

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A CurtainUp London Review

The Libertine

by Lizzie Loveridge

"I must always exceed or I don't feel I'm alive." — Rochester

Ophellia Lovibond as Elizabeth Barry and Dominic Cooper as the Earl of Rochester (Photo: Alastair Muir)

John Wilmot, the Second Earl of Rochester was a notorious rake. That rather jolly word which implies a drop dead gorgeous, womanising gentleman in a Georgette Heyer novel, just waiting to be smitten by the heroine, is far from the reality. Rochester is a man dead of the pox at the age of 33. Well it would have been described as the fun name, the pox, but it is likely to have been Syphilis, Gonorrhoea, or some other flesh destroying venereal disease. What we do know is that Rochester had to wear a silver filigree nose because his own had rotted away from disease and, in consequence, he probably smelled fairly nauseous, at least nothing that a clove scented orange could disguise.

Dominic Cooper, the sweet but sexually knowing boy Dakin from the first production of The History Boys, plays John Wilmot after a successful film career as the bridegroom Sky in Mamma Mia and many other roles. His boyish good looks have made him a reliable choice in films aimed at the teenage girl market but whether they will flock to see him at the Haymarket is debatable. We may also ask whether the innocent should see The Libertine when the opening of the second act involves a scene from Sodom, arguably not written by Rochester— a dance of women with personal dildos approaching a couple of feet long and used in explicit ways.

In 2004 Johnny Depp captured the infamous Earl on film and John Malkovich played Charles II. Dominic Cooper opens the play in a nice piece of meta-theatricality when he repeatedly tells us that we will not like him. "You will not like me now and you will like me a good deal less as we go on."

My rebellious nature tends to make me disagree and determine to like him. The introduction to the play is so well received, it feels like stand up. No pun intended. Indeed he has some charm but when we see how sour his neglected wife (Alice Bailey Johnson) has become after, as a Northern heiress and a virgin she chose to run away with him, we lose respect for him and liking for her.

There is a scene of some honesty when a renowned portrait painter of the day was portraying him and him and his wife, when Rochester suggests he should instead be painted with a performing monkey who is handing him a recently penned manuscript. Satire was one of Rochester the poet's strong points.

The visuals are sumptuous; not just the elegant Restoration costumes and wigs, which fortunately with dry cleaners don't smell as they once would have, but filling the rear of the stage is a glorious rococo, gilded frame with various close ups from paintings of the day, many of them of generous female anatomy. As the audience entered orange sellers offered to sell them oranges and a kiss.

Jasper Britton plays the Merrie Monarch but his contribution to seventeenth century England in The Libertine is his sexual peccadilloes and his capricious bestowing or withdrawing of favour. The king's scientific achievement is represented by an ornate and very beautiful, sundial which John Wilmot notoriously drunkenly destroyed. Stephen Jeffreys' play really tells us nothing of the architectural heights of Charles II's reign with the rebuilding of London after the Great Fire.

Rochester is involved with an actress, Elizabeth Barry (Ophelia Lovibond). His argument is that his playwriting shows "people as they are, squalid, sexual, in the gutter, whereas she hopes that plays will inspire the greater virtue". I have a friend who repeatedly says, "If a thing is worth doing, it's worth overdoing." The Earl of Rochester seeks this excess but consequently is never satisfied. The scenes from the contemporary theatre, the Playhouse, are chaotic, bawdy and explicit as Lizzy Barry uses that stylised acting of exaggerated gesture.

Maybe in 1994, The Libertine was more shocking. Somehow Stephen Jeffreys' play seems to say little more than debauchery will end badly but Terry Johnson's excellent production has good performances and brilliant design of what appeared to me to be a rather thin play.

For my review of the The Man of Mode production at the National Theatre in 2007 go here. The Man of Mode's central character was though to be based on John Wilmot Earl of Rochester and was first performed in 1676.

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PRODUCTION NOTES
The Libertine
Written by Stephen Jeffreys
Directed by Terry Johnson

Starring: Dominic Cooper, Jasper Britton, Ophelia Lovibond, Mark Hadfield, Alice Bailey Johnson
With: Will Barton, Cornelius Booth, Emily Byrt, Jonathan Hansler, Joseph MacNab, James Marchant, Will Merrick, Lydia Piechowiak, Lizzie Roper, Richard Teverson, Nina Toussaint White
Designed by Tim Shortall
Sound Design: John Leonard
Lighting Design: Ben Ormerod
Composer: Colin Towns
Running time: Two hours 30 minutes with an interval
Box Office: 020 7930 8800
Booking to 3rd December 2016
Reviewed by Lizzie Loveridge based on 27th September 2016 performance at Theatre Royal Haymarket 18 Suffolk Street London SW1Y 4HT (Tube: Trafalgar Square, Piccadilly Circus)
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