This article is from the source 'guardian' and was first published or seen on . It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.

You can find the current article at its original source at http://www.theguardian.com/stage/2014/may/27/bakersfield-mist-review-kathleen-turner-ian-mcdiarmid-duchess

The article has changed 3 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.

Version 0 Version 1
Bakersfield Mist review – Kathleen Turner dazzles but art tale is no masterpiece Bakersfield Mist review – Turner dazzles but art tale is no masterpiece
(about 1 hour later)
A desiccated art expert confronts an intuitively bright woman to debate the nature of authenticity. That situation was at the heart of Alan Bennett's A Question of Attribution and also lies at the core of this American play by Stephen Sachs. But, although it is vividly performed and inspired by a real-life case, it struck me as manipulative and implausible. Sachs's play was clearly suggested by the story of a woman who picked up what she claimed was a Jackson Pollock for five bucks in a California thrift store. In the play the woman is Maude, a boozy ex-bartender living in a trailerpark and desperate to have a painting she believes to be by Pollock authenticated. The expert who confronts her is Lionel, a former director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art who has been asked by an international foundation to either verify the painting or declare it a fake. A desiccated art expert confronts an intuitively bright woman to debate the nature of authenticity. That situation was at the heart of Alan Bennett's A Question of Attribution and also lies at the core of this American play by Stephen Sachs. But, although it is vividly performed and inspired by a real-life case, it struck me as manipulative and implausible.
What follows is a collision of cultures and class attitudes that goes beyond the subject of painting to ask which of the two characters is the more authentic. The confrontation of Maude's downright earthiness with Lionel's patrician snootiness, reinforced in this version by his British background, is initially very amusing. But I found it hard to credit that, within half an hour of his arrival, the buttoned-up Lionel would break down to reveal his inner demons to the extent of simulating his picturesque notion of Pollock ejaculating paint onto the canvas. Although the play is clearly an attack on the instant judgments we make on paintings or people, it strikes me as, in its own way, faintly patronising. Why is Maude meant to be more "authentic" because she happens to be a free-swearing beer-guzzler than Lionel who is a sexually repressed art historian? Sachs's play was clearly suggested by the story of a woman who picked up what she claimed was a Jackson Pollock for five bucks in a California thrift store. In the play, the woman is Maude, a boozy ex-bartender living in a trailer park and desperate to have a painting she believes was made by Pollock authenticated. The expert is Lionel, a former director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, who has been asked by an international foundation to either verify the painting or declare it a fake.
The play is clearly on the side of Maude, who is driven more by passion than money, but it is sentimental to argue that she is more "real" simply because she is working class. Even if I found much of the play hard to believe, I enjoyed watching the two performers under Polly Teale's direction. Kathleen Turner, last seen on the London stage as Martha in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, is excellent as Maude. She suggests a woman desperately seeking validation for her life as much as for the painting, and whose breezy extroversion conceals a caustic shrewdness and wit. Ian McDiarmid, as the less sympathetic Lionel, also conveys the natural curiosity of the trained fake-buster. The moment he sizes up the painting, stalking it as if it were a recalcitrant animal, is a joy to watch. It is the fault of the playwright, rather than McDiarmid, that I couldn't credit Lionel's reversion to sober detachment after a drunken bout of self-revelation. Much as I admired the acting though, Sachs's play, especially when compared to Bennett's multi-layered exploration of art and identity, strikes me as a load of Pollocks. What follows is a collision of cultures and class attitudes that goes beyond the subject of painting to ask which of the two characters is the more authentic. The confrontation of Maude's downright earthiness with Lionel's patrician snootiness, reinforced in this version by his British background, is initially amusing. But I found it hard to credit that, within half an hour of his arrival, the buttoned-up Lionel would break down to reveal his inner demons to the extent of simulating his vision of Pollock ejaculating paint onto the canvas.
Although the play is clearly an attack on the instant judgments we make on paintings or people, it strikes me as, in its own way, faintly patronising. Why is Maude, because she happens to be a free-swearing beer-guzzler, meant to be more "authentic" than Lionel, the sexually repressed art historian?
The play is clearly on the side of Maude, who is driven more by passion than money, but it is sentimental to argue that she is more "real" because she is working class.
Even if I found much of the play hard to believe, I enjoyed watching the two performers under Polly Teale's direction. Kathleen Turner, last seen on the London stage as Martha in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, is excellent as Maude.
She suggests a woman desperately seeking validation for her life as much as for the painting, and whose breezy extroversion conceals a caustic shrewdness and wit. Ian McDiarmid, as the less sympathetic Lionel, also conveys the natural curiosity of the trained fake-buster. The moment he sizes up the painting, stalking it as if it were a recalcitrant animal, is a joy to watch. It is the fault of the playwright, however, rather than McDiarmid, that I was unable to credit Lionel's reversion to sober detachment after his drunken bout of self-revelation.
Much as I admired the acting, Sachs's play, especially when compared with Bennett's multi-layered exploration of art and identity, strikes me as a load of Pollocks.
• Until 30 August. Box Office: 0844 412 4659• Until 30 August. Box Office: 0844 412 4659
• Quiz: Kathleen Turner's greatest lines
• Ian McDiarmid on the Citizens theatre: 'a temple of Dionysian excess'