What a Royal Mess!

A clean, sterile and very beige living room, fitted with innocuous IKEA flat packs with a touch of Parisian chic, though ostentatiously monotonous. The set is screaming out for some form of imperfection. Before the main action of the play, a man with a camera walks around as a projection showed, a stray hair on a toilet seat, a speck of dirt on the sofa. It’s almost perfect, but not for long.

Ubu Roi is a French language production by Cheek by Jowl, which has been much anticipated after their previous play at the Arts Centre, ‘Tis Pity She’s a Whore last year. Alfred Jarry’s 1896 work is a story of blood, wealth and power. Père Ubu wants the crown of Poland and his wife Mère Ubu wants the fortune it entails even more so. Père Ubu will kill anyone who gets in the way of his power trip.

Surprisingly the play takes place within the confines of an apartment. Initially the audience are presented with a family preparing for a dinner party; the husband and wife prepare the food in the kitchen whilst their grumpy teenage son sulks on the sofa, refusing to join in the preparations. The son is fixated by his video camera, the footage of which is projected onto the back wall. There is a great sense of awkwardness; the dialogue is almost inaudible and – in French – is unfathomable to much of the audience, which makes you wonder why should we be privy to such a bland scene?

The sulking teenager cannot take any more and jumps up: green light and white noise fill the stage. His parents are transformed into the animalistic Père and Mère Ubu. They descend into wonderfully anarchic behaviour; the perfect beige set is soon strewn with cornflakes, meat and ketchup. We dip in and out of this angsty teenager’s fantasy throughout the play, being taken from the tedious dinner party to great battles.

The living room is transformed into a snowy Russian wilderness. Household objects like a whisk and a toilet brush become the swords that kill the King of Poland before Père Ubu steals his crown – which incidentally is a lampshade. Nick Ormerod’s setting of this play is superb: the inventive use of ordinary furniture as the scenery of the battlefront transports the audience seamlessly between dinner party and bloody arena of war. A simple change in lighting is all it takes to transfer the cast from exchanging blows on the battlefield to exchanging pleasantries over cheese and wine.

Despite the chaos on stage, there is subtlety in such devastation. During the dinner party a character lights a cigarette on stage and the smell of tobacco fills the whole theatre; someone is smoking at the back of the auditorium to create cohesion between the stage and the theatre proper. Ketchup is used to draw maps on the back wall rather than just create a mess. When the play finishes the house lights illuminate the full extent of the destruction, however the viewer doesn’t mourn the neat beige room, instead you feel an attachment to the space upon which such madness has ensued.

As someone who has not looked at French since GCSE, I had reservations about seeing a French language production. Although the play was subtitled, the dialogue was so fast that the translation struggles to keep pace. Instead you focus on the physicality in this Cheek by Jowl production; language becomes secondary to movement, gestures and tones.

The choice of a dinner party juxtaposed with the tyranny and ego of Ubu Roi is a thought-provoking one by the director, Declan Donnellan. Not only do we sympathise with the grumpy teenager’s wish to break up the monotony of his parents’ dinner party through his wild fantasy, but you wonder whether every dinner party is a war between hosts and guests. Behind the small talk, middle class discussions and constant gratitude lies a forbidden desire to descend into pandemonium, throwing dinner on the floor and overthrowing your rivals.

Ubu Roi is a must see, an unapologetic farcical food fight, full of melodrama and energy. You will leave dazed and wondering what you have just watched unfold on stage.

Ubu Roi plays at Warwick Arts Centre until Saturday 2nd February.