Unlike Ibsen, who seems to be everywhere all at once, George Bernard Shaw’s dialectical plays have yet to gain traction in the revival market. By trimming the play down to 105 minutes, director Dominic Cooke might be accused of inflicting GBH on GBS but it is a noteworthy example of the playwright’s moral conundrum dramas.
The big draw is the casting of real life mother and daughter – Imelda Staunton and Bessie (Bridgerton) Carter – as wealthy ’businesswoman’ Mrs Kitty Warren and her estranged daughter Vivie.
This production is firmly weighted in favour of Vivie and Carter holds her own superbly as the cerebral maths graduate who aims for self-sustaining independence. She is the perfect foil for Staunton’s Mrs Warren, whose fortune has been made through a string of brothels across Europe.
The silent chorus of women clad in white bloomers like spectral sex workers haunts the circular stage – at first abundantly floral until stripped down to a bare, unforgiving office.
The drama relies on anticipation not only of what Mrs Warren’s profession actually is but also how it will impact Vivie when she finds out – as well as her disputed paternity. The confessional confrontations between the two are handled with decorous melodrama.
The two powerhouse central performances are supported by a handful of men from Kevin Doyle’s paranoid clergyman to Robert Glenister’s blustering old lecher; Reuben Gardner’s feckless dandy is amusing even if he seems like a refugee from an Oscar Wilde play.
As an intro to GBS it ain’t bad.
MRS WARREN’S PROFESSION: THE GARRICK TO AUGUST 16
