The National sometimes decides against something classic or something new and decides to go for something a bit offbeat and populist instead. Hence Theatre Of Blood, a stage version of the highly camp Hammer horror starring Vincent Price, which was staged a few years ago with Jim Broadbent in the main role. And following in this tradition comes A Matter Of Life And Death, a stage adaptation of the 1946 Powell and Pressburger movie starring David Niven as a pilot fated to die who falls in love with a wireless operator (Kim Hunter) then bizarrely avoids death and has to fight for his right to live at ‘heavenly’ court.
The film is pure kitsch and the stage adaptation takes this as its lead and it’s fun and unapologetically sentimental, with a live band and slushy songs underlining the romantic theme of love conquering all.
Co-produced by the National with Kneehigh Theatre, it’s a visually stunning adaptation and so there are plenty of acrobatics and wire work. Some of the stage images, such as time ‘standing still’ with a bed on a swing held stationery at an acute angle by several of the cast and several hospital beds forming a stairway in the climactic scene, are also beautifully crafted.
But at heart it’s a simple story and I couldn’t help thinking the musical interludes were just theatrical wallpaper to cover the gaps while they used the basic furniture of beds and two aluminium staircases to assemble yet another clever piece of circus-meets-inventive-non-naturalistic scene setting.
It’s still quite good fun, though, and it does have a poignant anti-war message tagged on the end. And the leads of Tristan Sturrock, Lyndsey Marshal and Douglas Hodge are all solid.
It’s not a major piece of work but it's fun and a good show for a date.
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