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(ear) (ear)
Sexy showgirl fails to seduce
Unholy alliance: Alice Coulthard as Christine Keeler and Paul Nicholas as Stephen Ward Keeler Wolverhampton Grand ***
SCANDAL, in these ‘kiss and tell' days, is hardly shocking
anymore. Straying footballers, randy politicians and celebrity
shenanagins still grace the red tops and clearly a public, obsessed by
the private lives of the famous, lap it all up. Far from
being shocked, though, society accepts it as the tittle-tattle of modern
life. But in the early 1960s, things
were very different. In 1961, the ‘summer of love' had yet to arrive and
Britain, still in post war recovery, retained an air of respectability
and order. High establishment figures
such as politicians and royalty were assumed and expected to be
squeaky clean and certainly above the kind of behaviour
that was about to rock the foundations of power, leading ultimately to
the downfall of the incumbent government. Christine Keeler was a
showgirl. She worked the revue bars of Soho, giving glimpses of feather
covered flesh to sleezy crowds of men ‘with only one thing on their
mind' . In her head, she was no ‘object'. She talked about being
‘empowered' by her performances - aware of what she was doing to
the imaginations of the mostly male crowd, but keeping them at arms
length. That, at least, was the theory. When ‘society osteopath'
Stephen Ward walked into the club one night, though, Keelers's life was
about to change. Ward took her under his wing, inviting her to move in
with him. As always, though, there was a condition. Ward was well
connected - he knew his high profile friends would lap up this new
ingénue about town. Parties followed, introductions were made and money
changed hands. Everyone wanted a piece, and Ward was happy to cash in.
The Pimp and the showgirl were quite a team.
John Profumo, a high ranking,
married politician was a guest at one of Ward's parties. Smitten by
Keeler, he embarked on a month long affair with her. All this may well
have have never come to light though, had Keeler not also an affair with
a Russian spy, Yevgeny Ivanov. It was this affair that rocked
the boat and fuelled one of the most intriguing court cases of the
decade. Worried that Keeler might pass on secret information (Britain
was, after all, in the grip of the cold War ) during her dangerous
liaisons with her Soviet lover, the powers-that-were knew they had to
take action. As details of her affair with
Ivanov unfolded, the tryst with Profumo was also exposed - leading him
to retract his earlier statement that he had not had relations with
Keeler. The scandal was reaching boiling point and proving deeply
embarrassing for Macmillan's government. The story has perfect
ingredients for a stage play. Sex. Intrigue. Power. Tension. On
top of that it's a true story - one that some in the audience
would actually remember - so it could and should be an edge of the seat
cracker. Sadly, it fails to deliver. It
feels ‘thin' and somewhat drawn out in parts. The information is
there - either as projections of newspaper headlines or within the
dialogue - but too often the action onstage is just not particularly
exciting or engaging. There is little connection
with the main characters and consequently the audience felt little or no
sympathy. The woman in the audience who proclaimed at some volume ‘She's
just a bit common, really, ain't she?' may well have lacked theatre
etiquette but she had a point. Keeler was more than that, of course, but
on this evidence it is hard to see. Paul Nicholas's Stephen Ward
has undoubted charisma. Nicholas has spent his career playing characters
with charm and it's not out of place here. Ward, despite his purely
profit driven agenda, must have been an engaging individual given the
company he kept. Alice Coulthard certainly
looks the part as Christine Keeler - something of a dream role for
an actress. Coulthard pitches her just right - portraying a hardened
soul getting increasingly out of her depth. At times, dialogue was
underplayed - even inaudible. Certain scenes needed cutting or at least
given more pace. Crucially, the courtroom scene was one of them. Staging
decisions, too, seemed odd. Coulthard stepping into a clearly
empty swimming pool, against no hint of ‘water sound' or even covering
music, was clumsy as was the sliding door that wouldn't slide. It almost has a feel of a play
that needs a couple more drafts. There is a real opportunity here
to tell a cracking good yarn. Sadly, for now, it's been missed. To
19-11-11. Tom
Roberts
*** MAYBE it's because we have become
accustomed to Parliamentary scandals these days, but this tale of how a
government Minister was brought down by a young showgirl is more
interesting than shocking. The play is based on Christine Keeler's
autobiography, The Truth at Last, but it doesn't tell the audience much
more than many already knew about Secretary of State for War John
Profumo's sordid affair with the attractive teenager nearly 50 years
ago. Unless it's the scene where the MP has sex with
the girl on a settee without removing his pin stripes! There are other titillating moments, with former
Emmerdale star Alice Coulthard stepping naked from a swimming pool,
giving married 'Jack' the lad Profumo his first sight of her, and
scantily-clad, shapely showgirls gyrating to music at various stages.
But that's it. Coulthard is certainly a convincing Keeler and
there is a fine performance from Paul Nicholas as society osteopath
Stephen Ward, who introduced her to various influential people,
including Russian naval attaché and spy Captain Ivanov (Andrew Grose) Ward eventually took his own life and Profumo,
having first assured the House of Commons that his relationship with
Keeler had been entirely proper, subsequently resigned when the truth
came out. Produced and directed by Nicholas, Keeler runs to
19.11.11 Paul Marston
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