Dr Faustus, the devil and me.....

The story of a man doing a deal with the devil to improve his life, or gain knowledge, or seek revenge on his enemies is an old one, told in different versions over many cultures.  I had read about Dr Faustus, the Christopher Marlow play, at school or maybe not (my school wasn't big on culture) and had a memory of it and thought the idea was an interesting one.  Last week I was given the opportunity to see it on the stage in London with a colleague and performed by the RSC so it had to be good, right? The Barbican itself is a strange mix of people, the audience can range from little old ladies sipping tea in the cafes to hipsters admiring the ugly buildings and people pretending to understand the more obtuse art installations (I never try to understand them). The audience for the play was a mix and of course the person sitting in front of me was the tallest human in the place, he had to be 8ft tall but most of it seemed to be leg so I could easily see over him. Sat two rows from the stage was great, I was up close to the performance and perhaps that was the highlight of the evening?

Dr Faustus

The play, as any play in fact can be, was interpreted with a modern twist, it was loud, intense and sometimes felt like some erotic cabaret with drag queens, loud music, blood, screaming and an undercurrent of homosexuality, especially between Faust and Mephistophilis. So Faustus does his deal with Lucifer then, if I understood the performance, goes on a big bender, drinking, lusting, fighting, playing pranks on the Pope and getting molested by an overweight Germany noblewoman.  The play had highlights of course, when Faustus demands that Helen Of Troy is brought back from the dead so he can gaze on her beauty (and possibly more than gaze), the script of the play is wonderful, the scene is moving and probably my favourite:

"Sweet Helen, make me immortal with a kiss. Her lips suck forth my soul: see where it flies. Come, Helen, come, give me my soul again."

--Act 5, Scene 2, Lines 99-101: Faustus to Helen of Troy

Faustus and Helen of Troy

And this when Mephostophilis talks of Hell to Faustus: 

"Why, this is hell, nor am I out of it. Think'st thou that I saw the face of God And tasted the eternal joys of heaven,

Am not tormented with ten thousand hells, In being deprived of everlasting bliss?"

--Act 1, Scene 3, Lines 76-80: Mephostophilis to Faustus

A good play is one that has great dialogue and Dr Faustus is no exception but this production of it was not what I expected, it played to a full house and the RSC almost always do a good job but I do recall seeing a performance of "Anthony & Cleopatra" in which the two leads came across as middle aged angry drunks fighting (similar to Taylor and Burton in 'Whose Afraid of Virginia Wolf')

If the play has a message for me it is this: don't ask for the impossible and beware of what you wish for. Some of these things can drive you insane!  This quote (that has existed for years but not sure where it comes from) seems to apply:

"If you get into bed with devil, eventually you get fucked"

September 24th, 2016