OLD SOHO SPEAKS AGAIN, AND WISELY
Of all of the locations you’d anticipate to see Quentin Crisp – whilst a ghost or tribute – one of many least possible is a wooded amphitheatre in Suffolk at nightfall, with a transparent moon rising via the branches and the final birds twittering innocently to roost. Crisp belonged moderately to 1930’s Soho streets, the place passers-by beat him as a matter in fact and even the homosexual golf equipment thought he was a bit a lot. So did the recruiting sergeant when battle got here and younger Crisp thought “fighting might be a nice change of agony”.
So he stayed residence whereas the US servicemen with their flawless complexions and {dollars}, “flooded in, like butter over green peas” to understand tarts of both intercourse. But life is unusual certainly: in his seventies and eighties all of a sudden he belonged to America as an alternative. A land the place “everyone who isn’t shooting you is your friend”, and the place massive theatres and packed tour dates gave his wit ultimately the appreciation it deserved.
He was lengthy a hero of mine for his scorn for mimsy housekeeping and the deathless line “Don’t keep up with the Joneses. Drag them down to your level, it’s cheaper”. I lastly met him, only for a few hours , in ‘90s New York. A deal with.
So in fact I nipped down the highway to see Mark Farrelly carry out his one-man tribute, from the nice maverick’s personal writings, on the new outside Thorington Theatre. I final noticed Farrelly as Frankie Howerd’s lover Denis in one other considerate play he wrote, a two-hander (https://theatrecat.com/2020/10/30/howerds-end-golden-goose-theatre-camberwell/) so I knew his means. Here, alone on the naked wooden stage with the previous Crisp’s purplish bouffant, Farrelly’s lengthy drawl and considerate, unafraid silences rang true sufficient.
And it’s a stunning script, taking him via youth as “a minority within a minority, an effeminate homosexual” and his hopeless dream of the Great Dark Man who would possibly love him; it goes via his painfully evolving philosophy, half ache and half joke :“If at first you don’t succeed, failure may be your style”. In a short coda as himself, Farrelly mentions that as a catalyst in his personal lowest, most suicidal yr a decade again. And it’s certainly among the finest philosophical jokes going.
The first half bravely ends with a dying fall, a contemplation of coming demise and advancing age. After the interval, although, he’s in a tuxedo on a stage on forty second road, having escaped perpetually the “vast rainswept Alcatraz” of Britain. Here he spent years confidently telling the brand new world the best way to stay. Again, he affords lapidary insights about holding on via despair, and the way if homosexual life grew to become potential as a result of in case you lean limply in opposition to the wall for lengthy sufficient, it falls. He expresses his headshaking scorn for “Pride” , preferring merely to name it fashion.
I had not encountered earlier than his moderately fantastic paean to human beings for our sheer braveness in merely having advanced – crept out of the ocean, grown limbs, realized to stroll upright, moved on. No God did it for us – “You did it! “ he cries. Though as ever, the undernote is “more fool us”. But hell, “there is no salvation, only laughter in the dark”. And lastly, associates, treasure his perception about us on the market within the viewers. “Throughout the world , a theatregoer is a middle-aged person with a broken heart”.
Excellent. Here’s to Quentin Crisp, and to Mr Farrelly for the tribute. As it roams the land, see in case you can catch it.
Touring via to 2024 : subsequent outings for Quentin Crisp Penzance & Newquay in September
http://markfarrelly.co.uk for tour particulars
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