Review: THE TREATMENT, Almeida Theatre

Martin Crimp's 1993 play feels sharply contemporary in this slick revival from Lyndsey Turner, with its layered deconstruction of the way that we treat both art and life as commodities - and how we mistreat one another - opening up industry satire into a far-reaching portrait of social malaise.

Anne has escaped a controlling husband who used to tie her up and silence her by placing tape over her mouth. She shares her story with two New York film producers, who gradually chip away at it: merging her experience with a voyeuristic script from a has-been writer; altering it to suit the purposes of a savvy actor; and questioning whether her reality feels 'real' enough to them. "This is not my idea of 'Anne'," says one, while Anne herself looks on in bewilderment.

Crimp provides caustically funny if familiar send-up of soulless movie execs who fetishise authenticity, while sacrificing everything and everyone on route to commercial success, but these are gags with purpose. The opening scene, in which a traumatised Anne recalls details of her abuse and the producers casually pick them apart with one eye on the screen version, is a chillingly good study of what happens when we drain human interaction of empathy.

The notion of serving up life as entertainment is even more fundamental now, with the blurring of boundaries caused by "reality" TV and our online avatars, countless biopics and dramatic retellings of past events, and the true crime wave led by Serial and Making a Murderer. "No one's story is their own," is the pat justification of Indira Varma's producer Jennifer, who purchases another woman's life with terrifying casualness.

The fantastic Varma provides a riveting monster for our age: unwaveringly assured and solipsistic to the point of sociopathy. It's an audacious, darkly comic turn that almost draws admiration for Jennifer, before brutally reminding us of the destructive consequences of her constant dismissing, degrading and dehumanising of others.

As her husband and producing partner, Julian Ovenden is amusingly feckless, seduced by the ideal of Anne the pure ingénue in need of rescue and bleatingly self-righteous when confronted. Ian Gelder is excellent as playwright Clifford, reduced to selling crockery in an alley, but rushing to assure everyone he had big hits in the Sixties (and producing a crumpled playbill as evidence).

As befits someone constantly under discussion, Aisling Loftus produces a deliberately ambiguous Anne: sometimes tremulous, plaintive and childlike, doing handstands against the wall; sometimes manipulative and even complicit. There's great support too from Ben Onwukwe as a blind taxi driver cheerily asking passengers for directions, Ellora Torchia's put-upon but ambitious assistant, Matthew Needham as Anne's menacing husband Simon, and Gary Beadle as the actor keenly alert to negative portrayals of black characters.

References to the racist, classist and sexist elements of the industry feel depressingly pertinent. Jennifer queasily repositions 'Anne' in titillating fashion, more attuned to the aesthetics of the film than the actual person's emotional response, and denies her a voice as much as if she was taping her mouth shut; their financial disparity makes this all the more unsettling. Nicky then shifts the debate by arguing that Anne not struggling in real life is dangerous for the drama, making her yet another passive, "dead meat" female victim.

Crimp's piece is a deliberately challenging watch, with its overlapping dialogue and post-modern gags; no sooner has Clifford argued for Shakespearean parallels in the story than we get a Lear-like maiming, underscoring the characters' metaphorical blindness. Crimp also teasingly questions his own work, with Simon - who issues ominous warnings about Anne's corruption - dismissing theatre that tells us "the world is a heap of shit".

But Turner's vivid production ensures the play isn't overwhelmed by its professed cleverness. Giles Cadle's design, effectively lit by Neil Austin, provides further unreality: a hallucinatory version of New York, bathing a sterile corporate world in lurid bright colours. There are hints of American Psycho's urban, surface-obsessed vacuity, along with a hellish descent, from the office elevator to the bowels of the subway; Simon describes a city "burrowing down". Choreographed by Arthur Pita, background performers bustle past, evoking the city crowds carelessly blind to their fellow humans' need.

The odd reference dates the play, such as sushi as novelty cuisine, and Crimp's short scenes disturb the momentum; Turner using a screen showing the dashboard camera of a cab crawling through the blurry New York streets to cover scene changes doesn't quite solve that problem. But this is still a worthwhile rediscovery, combining macabre wit with incisive interrogation.

The Treatment at Almeida Theatre until 10 June

Photo credit: Marc Brenner

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