The Talented Mr Ripley
The Burton Taylor Theatre until Nov 30th 2002

This Phyllis Nagy adaptation of Patricia Highsmith's famous novel is a colder, bleaker work than the recent film adaptation, mostly told in monologue to the audience and in shifting, half-narrative, half-performed sequences between characters separated by time, space and even death.

Anomie Productions' savagely short presentation of the play relishes a desperate wistfulness which seems slightly at odds with a story which is actually about succeeding in finding the doors to a life of wealth and privilege, kicking them in, and triumphantly usurping the place of our better-off friends.

It almost feels like a one-man show, best when Tom Ripley (played
intensely but unevenly by Coleman Crenshaw), is centre stage and the other characters mere pliant extensions of his diseased pyche. When independent of Ripley's scheming, the idle children of the rich are sweetly innocent, and almost too likeable and lovely. Particularly Harry Lloyd, as Richard Greenleaf, oozes effortless, arrogant charm, easy as the lazy jazz which from the outset signals a world of luxury and leisure dangling just out of Ripley's reach. Elisabeth Gray adds bohemian charm as Marge, and Sam Brown a
little seductive local colour. But when he gets it all; the girls, the boys, the beautiful appartment, it seems to hang on him as badly as Ricky's expensive suits.

Ripley's final triumph is delivered only to the audience, face thrown back, disintegrating into harsh light, his beguiling tale of amorality dissolving into awkward, angry pronouncements, lost between shouting and silence.

It's a long, complicated plot and this whistle-stop dash through it
feels fast, loose and unsubtle, but, on the bright side, it's glorously
violent, wastes no time, and cuts straight to the brutal heart of the story. Look out for a fun turn as a detective straight from the pages of a novel from Adam Gidwitz.

Jeremy Dennis