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Broken Glass (Vaudeville Theatre, London)

Verdict: A bit of a pane

Rating: 2 Star Rating

There is fancy acting to be seen at the Vaudeville — Sir Antony Sher and Tara Fitzgerald all revved up — but the play is not much cop.

Arthur Miller wrote Broken Glass towards the end of his life, by which time he was so worshipped by the Establishment that no one seems to have been prepared to wield the red pencil.

It’s about guilt, self-loathing, psychoanalysis and Jewishness. Lots of Jewishness. To a nice Anglican boy like me, this soon became a bore.

Disappointment: Despite its stellar leads, Broken Glass is not much cop

Disappointment: Despite its stellar leads, Broken Glass is not much cop

We are in the late Thirties. New Yorker Phillip Gellburg (played by Sir Antony) wants to play down his Jewishness. Gellburg’s pretty wife (porcelain-cheeked Miss Fitzgerald) is unwell, having lost the power of her legs.

Randy Dr Hyman (Stanley Townsend) thinks Mrs Gellburg’s illness is in her mind, but that doesn’t stop him trifling with her affections.

Has Mrs Gellburg been sent mad by her under-sexed husband? Or by newspaper reports from Hitler’s Germany?

Old man Gellburg is a nightmare, fretting and screaming and grinding and generally chewing himself up. Sir Antony immerses himself in the role. If his moodswings seem far-fetched, the fault lies with the playwright.

Lots of Jewishness: But Tara Fitzgerald pierces the heart

Lots of Jewishness: But Tara Fitzgerald pierces the heart

Miss Fitzgerald is roughly as Jewish as the late Queen Mother, yet she still pierces the heart.

I’m not sure it’s a terribly likeable play. It struck me Miller might be agonising over his brief marriage to Marilyn Monroe — like Mrs Gellburg, a flawed beauty. Or was he wading into issues about Jewish-American identity? Minefield.

Collectors of top acting may find things to savour. And the cello played between scenes by Laura Moody is superb. But when the Gellburgs’ story came to an unhappy end, I felt little but relief.

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