THE HABIT OF ART

By Elizabeth Marchetti
05/12/2009

Alan Bennet´s new play "The Habit of Art" showing at the National Theatre until March 2010 is a witty and original comedy on the nature of producing art, which provides a wondeful insight into the lives and mental pattern of artists and their emotional engagement in atypical lives.

The story itself is a play within a play: we see actors, screen writers and stage managers rehearsing"Caliban´s Day", which tells of the imaginary meeting between two acclaimed artists towards the end of their lives- the poet WH Auden and music composer Benjamin Britten.

The two are almost each other´s anthitesis: Auden is a gay free spirit, self-deprecating and loud individual, perfectly portrayed by Richard Griffith, while Britten, played by Alex Jennings, is an uptight and constrained man who to this day hides his homosexuality and takes himself
very seriously.
The old time friends hadn´t seen each other in twenty years, so Britten who is lacking inspiration turns to Auden for help in his ultimate challenge:
writing the libretto for Thomas Mann´s "Death in Venice" an opera about an older man who is seduced by a young boy. It is while discussing their ideas in Auden´s messy studio that the artistic and personal differences betwee the two are apparent and make for a brutally honest discussion.
This leaves them shaken and wondering about their credibility as both human beings and artists.

During this randez-vous the main characters are interrupted by a rent boy, who had come to service Auden and a BBC journalist who had come to interview him called Humhrey Carpenter, played by Adrian Scarborough, who turns out to be their future biographer.  The latter also assumes the part of a capricious attention-seeking actor.

A diversive is added by the play writer and stage manager, played by throaty brilliance Frances de La Tour, who intervene with their remarks and tend to stabilyse the relationship between child-like actors ´ diva behaviours and their influence on the play´s deliverance.
The pace at which the actors switch from play to play is as complex as it is delightful and requires superb acting skills which luckily, veteran actors like Griffith and Jennings, possess nonchalantly.

Unless you are a Pirandello expert, "The Habit of Art" can be confusing initially. For this reason, the first act is introductory and not very rich of climax: it rather accustoms us to the constant banter in the play´s dinamics; but it is during the second act that the pace picks up and the
script flourishes with funny gems: jokes on the English, on artists and on the habit of art which carry on to a melancholy reflection on far more
serious themes such as life, death, art, sex and frienship. All this is done with an underlining dry irony and comedic brilliance.

In the end, it becomes apparent that putting a play together or creating an abstract piece of work that will persist in history for years to come is no easy task and comes at a big price. Surely, there is at least one thing all the artists have in common: the fear of the public and ultimately, of themselves.


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Elizabeth Marchetti

Lifestyle editor artslondonnews.co.uk
Free-lance journalist