Shared Experience bring the sights and sounds on India brilliantly to life in this adaptation of EM Forster's complex novel. There is something indefinable here which evokes the subcontinent's mystery and beauty.
Adela Quested arrives in India with the expectation of marrying Ronny, the local magistrate. Frustrated by the separation of whites from local people, and already disillusioned with colonial attitudes, she makes a friendship with an attractive and cultured Muslim, Doctor Aziz, who shows her and her future mother-in-law around a local tourist attraction, the Marabar Caves. Whilst the events that occur there are left obscure, it seems her contact with Eastern culture gives her a spiritual experience far detached from Christianity which she interprets as her having been assaulted by Aziz.
The whites take this as confirmation of the bestiality of the Indian people and arrest the doctor. Only Mr Fielding, a teacher who respects and understands Indians takes Dr Aziz's side. The battle lines are drawn - Indians resenting the victimisation of a respected member of their community and the British defending one of their own against a hostile tribe who ought to be grateful for having been colonised.
The most striking element of this play is the portrayal of EM Forster's insight into the racism and cultural ignorance of the British colonists and their inability to see the world through the eyes of the people they rule - or indeed to see them as people at all. We see how a fixed attitude leads someone to ridiculous extremes of conduct and belief. The 'British' virtues of justice,humanity and honesty are defended through a show-trial, corruption and wanton cruelty.
In every scene, the acting is superb and there are some familiar faces here. The lack of chemistry between Fenella Woolgar's Adela and Simon Scardifield's Ronny is as excellently portrayed as the homo-erotic encounters of Fielding and Aziz. The colour and life of India flash across the stage in contrast to the staid and imprisoned existence of the colonists.
Martin Sherman's adaptation is particularly accomplished because it extracts from the book a Hindu world view which is distinctly alien and incomprehensible to Westerners - accentuating the cultural divisions between the two races.
To cram such an intricate book into two and a half hours of performance is a feat in itself but this production also captures the more subtle and elusive themes of the novel.
Not just a good story, but a wonderful experience...
A Passage To India is on at the Nottingham Playhouse until Saturday 23 October
Other theatre articles by Adrian
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