Playhouse, Salisbury – until 27 January 2018. Reviewed by Sharon MacDonald-Armitage
3*
Adapting the iconic E.M Forster novel A Passage to India for stage is an ambitious task and one that is realised superbly on screen in David Lean’s Oscar winning epic film. The skill in any stage success is making the vastness and colour of India come to life in what in comparison is a small space.
In India to visit her son, local magistrate, Ronny (Edward Killingback), Mrs Moore (Liz Crowther) and Ronny’s future wife, Adela (Phoebe Pryce) are excited by the prospect of seeing the ‘real’ India. Having met the young Indian doctor Aziz (Asif Khan), whose ebullient personality captures Mrs Moore, they all go on a trip to the Marabar caves. Aziz believes the colonial English and the Indians can be friends. However, when Adela accuses him of assaulting her we see how the British colonial system reacts and closes ranks.
With Fielding (Richard Goulding) being by far the most the successful character at developing and sustaining relationships with the local Indians and having formed a friendship with Aziz, he is the only British person supporting him during the accusations and trial. It is this friendship that is warming to the heart and seems devastating when it falters.
The caricaturing of Britishness runs rife throughout the piece and as such offers little opportunity to really understand the characters and motivation for their behaviour. There is a certain discomfort seeing this bullying colonial behaviour take place and perhaps this is where the play falls short. There is so little time in which to develop both plot and characters that the richness of the original book is lost. In the current political climate where colonialism is frowned upon to the point of needing to be apologetic this play highlights Britain’s colonial past.
The darkness of the piece is reflected in the minimal set design (Dora Schweitzer) but at the same time the richness of India appears somewhat lost.
Prema Mehta’s lighting design works well in context of the piece and the spots of colour that pepper it make for light relief. Perhaps, more should have been made of the music in order to evoke the ‘real’ India Mrs Moore and Adela are so clearly attracted to.
This production is one that clearly suffers from lack of time, to try and compress and contain such a vast story within two and a half hours is a real challenge and one I’m not sure has been achieved fully here.