NOISES OFF at the Garrick - Death by Sardine

In 2001 I saw NOISES OFF at the National Theatre in a production directed by Jeremy Sams and starring Patricia Hodge and Peter Egan.  I had been told, by people whose opinion I usually respect, that it was one of the funniest things they had ever seen.  I think I smiled twice.  I assumed that the production was at fault - but how to explain the rest of the audience falling into the aisles laughing?

Here we are 18 years later and I thought I would give it another go, now the recent Lyric Hammersmith production directed by Jeremy Herrin has transferred to the Garrick.  I smiled twice.  Once again, I was surrounded by punters who were guffawing like mad.  So I guess it must be me.

I still feel NOISES OFF is totally soulless; it is as if Michael Frayn read every treatise and dissertation on the mechanics of comedy and understood that if a door is slammed x times within x minutes, and someone trips over x times within x minutes the audience will laugh out loud.  I feel like it was written to this scientific research by someone who has no natural sense of humour.

It's not that I don't enjoy farce; sit me in front of Joe Orton's LOOT and I will be laughing like mad, but what LOOT has that NOISES OFF has not is any real sense of dangerous anarchy.  There is nothing anarchic in Frayn's play, mainly because his characters - a company of actors appearing in a lame touring farce under an egotistical director - are as two-dimensional and stereotypical backstage as they are on it.  So Frayn's famous second act when a mid-week matinee descends into chaos onstage as we see the cast fighting backstage, means nothing at all because there is no real sense of danger among the actors.

Of course it could just be that NOISES OFF has been superseded by what has come after it namely Victoria Wood's ACORN ANTIQUES which managed to deliver exactly what Frayn strives for over two hours in a five-to-ten minute sketch.

Meera Syal is always a pleasure to see onstage but I simply didn't believe what her character - or her character's character - was doing.  Lloyd Owen had some amusing moments as the tyrannical director which was surprising as he is an actor who usually leaves me cold.  The main problem for me was that the supposedly escalating chaos both on and off stage is so painstakingly played and well-rehearsed; you could see them practically getting into each position before the set-up happened so nothing was a surprise.  It was the most cautious slapstick ever.

I think I have given NOISES OFF enough chances.