CAT ON A HOT TIN ROOF

These are just two of endless examples where there is a rift between the production and the play itself. Of course great works can be and should be up for reinterpretation, but Andrews often seems to be actively working against the play, obnoxiously ignoring the things in it that don’t fit his artistic vision. In the pre-show interview, he calls Williams “the great poet of desire”, and yet desire is not a part of the engine that makes ‘Cat’ work. In fact, it is the absence of desire that Williams is working with, so the badly manufactured desire and sexuality in the production feels entirely false, typified by the fact that the cast seem completely at sea. Miller is doing the best she can with a role as enormously iconic as Maggie, but without guidance through the unforgiving rhythms and accent that come with the character, she can barely keep it from being one-note. O’Connell fares far worse, wandering aimlessly through Williams’ text to the point of almost drowning in it. He can also barely maintain the Southern accent, and there’s almost no spark between this Maggie and Brick. The only actor that comes out of this well is Meaney, who shines as Big Daddy, able to find the heart that the production clearly does not care about finding itself.

Perhaps the worst thing about this production though is how ‘Cat’ has been filtered through a stifling heterosexual male lens. Brick is mostly naked for a large chunk of the production, which is an interesting and justifiable dramaturgical choice, but Andrews balances that with having Maggie appear naked as well, something far less justifiable, exploitative and often completely at odds with what the play is actually saying. Then again, should we be surprised from a man who opened his repulsive film ‘Una’ with objectifying male-gaze-heavy shots of a female sexual assault victim having a shower. And then there’s the queer subtext - perhaps the most famous aspect of ‘Cat’ - where Brick’s sexuality is called into question in a manner that is still powerful even today. Andrews though seems to cut if off at the legs, dancing around the question in order to preserve Brick’s manhood and ultimately not engage with one of the fundamental themes of the play - that lies and secrets kept quiet will rot us away. Again, the signs are there when none of the accompanying interviews even mention Williams’ homosexuality. It is as if the dominating heterosexual male paradigm has, as it has done with so much, taken something that doesn’t adhere to it narrative and lobotomised it to do so. The 1958 film may have removed the queer subtext completely, but this approach feels so much worse.

It’s clear that this production of ‘Cat on a Hot Tin Roof’ thinks it’s very clever, with the direction parading around the stage showing off while asking the actors to do things that look neither truthful or natural (there’s a moment where Big Mama, played by Lisa Palfrey, goes and destroys a cake that is so bizarre as to feel robotic). Benedict Andrews is one of those directors who clearly believes himself greater and cleverer than the material he works with, which in my opinion, is one of the worst kind. For a play that burns with longing and pain and soul, this production just ends up being banal, obnoxious and aimless.