11:54am Monday 1st February 2010
By Jo Bayne
This is one of those plays you can see over and over again and draw something different from it each time.
Alan Bennett’s brilliant writing of course has much to do with that, but it is also the subject – education – which never fails to stimulate endless debate.
The debate here is about the nature and purpose of education. Is it simply the assimilation of facts to pass exams, score points in the league tables, or to create well rounded, independent-minded, thinking individuals?
Gerard Murphy plays Hector, the inspirational English teacher at a mediocre grammar school. His anarchic and entertaining methods are regarded as irrelevant.
The headmaster (Thomas Wheatley) is not only anxious to do well in the school league tables, he has an overweening ambition to be able to boast of Oxbridge success, which has so far eluded him. Wheatley brings delicious irony to his portrayal of a single minded pragmatist.
He brings in Irwin (Ben Lambert), a bright young man who knows all the tricks of exam success, to coach the promising candidates. Lambert plays him with cleverly deceptive blandness.
If you were lucky enough to have a Hector in your school days you will recognise with affection the qualities that Murphy brings to the role – a disregard for the orthodox, a benign sense of mischief and an all-embracing enthusiasm for knowledge of any kind, be it poetry or word perfect knowledge of famous film endings.
Penelope Beaumont is a strong balancing factor as Mrs Lintott the history teacher.
There is a great bunch of boys too, in particular Kyle Redmond-Jones as the manipulative Dakin; James Byng as the immature Posner; Peter McGovern as the sports-mad Rudge and Rob Delaney as the religious Scripps.
The set is curiously understated although none the worse for that but the decision to use the revolving stage was mystifying.
The play began its tour in Bath and it’s worth catching on its national tour if you can.
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