Published: Tuesday, 5 March 2002, 12:01 PM GMT
Playing it for thrills
By Robin Duke
It's hardly surprising that one of author and playwright Ira Levin's greatest fans is horror maestro Stephen King.
Apart from this regularly revived thriller, his cv includes Rosemary's Baby, The Stepford Wives and The Boys from Brazil – each one an acutely observed but frequently irreverent exercise in a particular genre.
Perhaps that's why Deathtrap has always worked so well on stage yet flopped so noticeably at the cinema when the symmetry of two acts with three scenes each taking place in just the one room was replaced by screenwriter Jay Presson Allen's version of what was witty.
Here director Peter Wilson remains faithful to the 1978 Broadway hit – typewriters not computers, a cordless phone but no mobiles, a cinema screen to flesh out off-stage action and enough one liners to reveal Levin as a closet comedy writer.
David Soul is Sidney Bruhl, a once successful thriller writer now living off his wealthy wife's money and suffering from a serious bout of wordblock. When a former student at one of his writing workshops sends him the plot of a perfect thriller the wheels appear to be set in motion – does he beg, borrow, steal or kill for it?
Suffice it to say very little is as it seems but unlike Agatha Christie Levin allows flexibility in his characters.
Soul is certainly no Michael Caine (the film version's Bruhl) – and for that we can be thankful. Nor is he a 21st century Hutch (as in Starsky and . . .).
Instead he delivers a performance of the first calibre with a voice like stressed leather soaked in finest bourbon and some perfect comic timing.
One time Bouquet of Barbed Wire sex siren Susan Penhaligon is his weak hearted wife Myra, who likewise knows when to go for the jugular and when to aim at the comic vein.
Slim as a wraith Gerald Kyd is the aspiring writer Clifford Anderson, camp and confident in equal measures, and the cast of this very satisfying production is completed by Stewart Bevan as the solid solicitor Porter Milgrim and Becky Hindley as the wacky psychic Helga. |
A Deathtrap of twists
by Rachel Sills
IF you enjoy thrills of the white-knuckle variety, you'll love Deathtrap at Blackpool's Grand Theatre. The clever thriller, starring David Soul (formerly Hutch, of Starsky and Hutch) as Sidney Bruhl, a gruff but endearingly witty writer of hit Broadway plays who is struggling to repeat his earlier successes, has more twists than a Chubby Checker dance convention. When young writing student Clifford Anderson sends him one of his plays to assess, Bruhl realises it is a sure-fire hit -- one which he would be happy to pass off as his own. So he and his wife (played by Susan Penhaligon) invite the aspiring playwright over to their isolated Connecticut house to discuss the play. But all is not as it seems. A first, shocking death is only the start of a roller-coaster adventure of deceit and double dealing. Soul is utterly convincing as Bruhl, who is by turns cold-blooded, funny and long-suffering. He manages to make the character, despite all the evidence, into an engaging and likeable guy. And Penhaligon is the perfect foil as his loyal but highly-strung wife. The young writer, played by Gerald Kyd (Dr Sean Maddox in Casualty) camps it up wildly and an added helping of humour -- and surprise -- comes in the form of interfering psychic neighbour Helga ten Dorp (Becky Hindley). Although the biggest and best surprise is in the first act, the action and the twists never flag. Stylish, clever and supremely entertaining, Deathtrap was Broadway's longest-running thriller. It's easy to see why. Deathtrap runs until Saturday at 7.30pm, with a matinee on Saturday at 2.30pm.
Reviewed by Rachel Sills
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