The Counterfeiters' Tragedy was directed for the London stage by
first-time fringe director Tod Higginson. Following is a short
essay with some narrative and contextual analysis, and hopefully
without too many 'spoilers'...
Change, Sex, Redemption and Commerce in The
Counterfeiters' Tragedy
It's a flattering
and
thrilling thing to be able to stage the premiere production of a new,
but authentically Jacobean drama. For those who don't know, The
Counterfeiters' Tragedy is a modern Jacobean pastiche, with more
than a few 21st century twists and turns. Blank verse, Senecan
structure and 17th century setting, contrast with some very modern
behaviours and attitudes in a work that links one arm with 'Tis
Pity She's a Whore or The Revenger's Tragedy, and the
other with Kill Bill or Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.
In
fact, both Tarantino and the new generation of Japanese jidaigeki
and Chinese wu-xia filmmakers
have much in common with the theatre of blood drama of our
forebears. They deal with honour, with revenge, with behaviour
that is often amoral yet internally logical; we are shown the results
of economic power being traded, or snatched; and the results of when
money is given precedence over life, the behaviour that results when
'authority' is challenged, and when established mores are subverted
or broken. Like Jacobean drama, these are combined with a
deftness and lightness of style that is as energetic and engaging as
it is cathartic, even when steeped in blood. The subject matter
and fate of the protagonists may often be bleak, but the stylish and
breathless performance is balletic and even sublime. The
virtuous and the morally indifferent may meet their fates along the
well as the miscreant; all in all it can be an exciting and
unpredictable ride.
The strong female characters and level of
sexual ambiguity in Counterfeiters give the show an additional
cutting edge that slices-and-dices its way through to today's
audience, backed by the linguistic power, political transgressiveness
and amoral relish of the drama driven by the uncertain and dangerous
political climate of the seventeenth century. In the best
tradition of the English plays of the Jacobean period, a foreign
setting (Italy, where hot blood and passions can
run
riot, at least in literature) provides the means examine our own
society; the 'other' is proxy for the self. The drama is a smoked
mirror through which we may be presented with ourselves, awry, but
recognisable.
The Counterfeiters' Tragedy is set in
early 17th century Italy, as the established power base of land and
heredity starts to give way to the portable power of currency and
commerce. Not so coincidentally, our staging was produced at a
time where, in London and elsewhere, the scales have tipped back
towards property as the base of socio-economic power, where soaring
rents and purchase prices again begin to alter lifestyles
extensively.
The economic realities of the world of the Counterfeiters feels
strikingly familiar; the power
politics
are distinctly feudal, but the desire for social mobility and the
portable power of currency subverts established order. From an
agrarian rural economy of the Italian countryside, Roberto plots his
course towards the acquisition of material wealth and possessions,
rather than a more nebulous sense of power or lust. Even
further, it's only the act of acquisition that provides any relief -
the possessing in itself is relatively unimportant. Having
wormed his way through his inheritance quickly, and with his appetite
for acquisition unsated and unsateable, Roberto has almost no choice
but to seek power to maintain his lifestyle.
Roberto's
behaviour is driven by an acquisitory instinct, power through
purchase, and sense of entitlement, that consumes him without ever
leaving him satisfied. His involvement with women, too, has
hints that it's about the acquisition, not the possession - his
unhealthy entanglement with his sister, his cruel attitude toward
Giovanna and a possible acquisatory eye on Emilia (who is smart
enough to see through him) point to wanting to-have-had, but having
no interest in maintaining possession.
Roberto's subversive
modernism is counterpointed with Stefano's regard for family,
history, and honour. The young Duke-Regent's sense of the past
weighs heavily upon him. His father's
campaign
achievements will eclipse his, no matter what his own successes.
He has a sense of duty and responsibility, in spite of, or perhaps
because of, his own beliefs and desires.
Stefano's
sexuality, and its presentation in the play (as almost exclusively
homo-centric rather than hetero-centric), are particularly
interesting, as while his sexuality is a strong driving force in the
story, in itself is not the story, as seems to be the case in many
otherwise laudable mainstream contemporary works. Counterfeiters
is not fatalistic, despite the instances of
fateful and fatal choices and prescience; but it does present the
notion that human endeavour seldom has the intended outcome; and the
characters struggle to adapt to their altered situations, without
exception failing to get, or keep, what they set out to.
Stefano establishes himself as an
agnostic, if not absolutely an atheist, with his beliefs about life
and afterlife; but because of this, his sense of legacy and
responsibility to the history of this world is higher. He is
unwilling to be the one to lose the Dukedom from his family. He
seeks to cast himself in the mould of the great soldiers of antiquity
and legend; Achilles, or perhaps Alexander. While not
uncomfortable per-se with his sexuality, he is heavily conflicted by
his love for Girolamo, a bookish youth, not a comrade in arms as
Patrokolus to Achilles. And he is unable to make the choice of
'the warmth of a bed' and a quiet life with Girolamo, presented here
potentially as a positive, redemptive prospect (and possible, with
discretion, even in seventeenth century Italy), over revenge and
the 'call
of his campaign'. At length he's even willing to countenance
political (and possibly eventually sexual) union with Giovanna to
restore his state and family.
For the narrative to
maintain a progress of its own, and not be merely a depiction of the
aftermath and ripples of an initial transgression, redemption must be
a tangible possibility; for Stefano, the available redemption is such that his
personality and climate leads him to refuse it, but it is no foregone
conclusion.
For Giovanna, the chance of redemption only
emerges with the revelation of Roberto's calumny; his initial
advances, prompting the initial transgression, offer her a convincing,
but counterfeit, sense of redemption from a marriage devoid of
excitement, although not entirely devoid of affection.
Giovanna's religiosity provides no barrier to this - for her, Venus
is a higher authority any man, institution, or any other god.
Giovanna later comes to make tangible steps
towards redemption, with her vengeance transfigured into desire to
restabilise, but by this time there are so many active elements in play,
'free radicals', to borrow a modern scientific term, that 'between the
desire and the enactment there is many a slip'.
Octavia's moral
corruption and dark seeds of vengeance are somewhat more oblique.
Certainly she is no less bloodthirsty than her brother Roberto; and
there's a hint that she's initially spurred on to set the plot in
motion with the idea that she's been rejected by Stefano. As
the highest ranking (and with such a compact cast of characters, the
only) eligible lady not related to him by blood or marriage, she
might have had a long held expectation to one day become Duchess, an
expectation probably shared and encouraged by the Duke, Giovanna, and
Roberto.
With the idea that Stefano may have rejected her romantic and
sexual advances on the eve of going to war, the humiliation would
stew, and she and Roberto contrive their plot via letters sent to and
from the field. Denied another object of sexual attention, a
latent incestuous desire grows, and between them a plot is contrived
to place Roberto as 'head man'. Her subsequent quest for
revenge is not alone enough to condemn her, but though sin is not
always punished, naivete often is.
Only Roberto seems
beyond redemption in the human sphere; his sociopathy offers him no
possibility of remorse or change, and, dissatisfied with his prize,
nothing can fill the void for him. If the last refuge of a
scoundrel is religion, the efficacity of his late call for redemption
may depend on authorities outside of this sphere.
While the
'noble' characters in the world of the Counterfeiters behave
generally ignobly and unpredictably, the position of the worker in
the world of the play is particularly precarious; their aspirations
and choices are restricted by the behaviour and attitudes of those
with pre-existing power. The repercussions of the shaking of an
established order may offer a one shot chance at money or
advancement; but for the unwary, the pearls are as likely to be poison.
For the workers in Counterfeiters, the jingle
of coins is not about affluence or luxury - it's about survival and a
measure of independence and self determination, not needing to be
reliant on the continuing good favour of a 'master'; and the
generosity of the masters or masters' successors with the advent of
old age or ill health. A small amount of capital would redeem
them from servitude and dependence, and enable them to set up with an
inn or a bawdy-house, a small trading enterprise or a money lending
business. With the example of the Ferryman, to have a boat is a
means to make some disposable income, and not be entirely dependent
on the land for sustenance.
For Lucia, a high-status lady's
maid, her continued employment will be based on her disposition, her
appearance, and her ability to work. The offer of a capital sum
for her part in a murder plot is impossible to resist. A small
sum might buy a hostelry in the manner of Mistress Quickly's, and may
even attract a hard-up but handsome husband.
The alternative? Begging, stealing, and whoring, should she no
longer be desired as a lady's maid.
For Alessandro and
Benetto, the two soldiers, their duties probably vary between tax
collecting, light 'policing' of the surrounding countryside, and
guard duty in the castle. Where 'preferment comes by the
letter', to have a powerful man in one's debt is a short cut to
advancement, but equally, dangerous for all concerned. Staking
their allegiance to Stefano is a calculated gamble, but the
expectations of the two parties are at odds. For Stefano, of
the old family, old money and hereditary expectations, preferment and
payment is the great man's gift, not the labourer's right, and may be
offered or withdrawn according to his whim. But for new man
Alessandro, 'When I am owed my wages, I'll not beg'. His
allegiance is a commercial property, the only one he has, and to be
maintained it must be paid for. The masterless man has in
common with the wandering ronin; and when loyalty is no longer
a
social or economic advantage, it will be withdrawn or
reversed.
Hemingway wrote, 'all stories end with death'; The
Counterfeiters' Tragedy, does literally (and in spades), and
metaphorically. All the
Machiavellian machinations, the plots, the best-laid plans, are
thwarted by death; of plotters, of messengers, of revengers, of
innocents. The playing out of human drama on this ultimate
scale has a quality at once operatic and personal; and we are
redeemed through witnessing the error, the calumny, and the virtue of
others.
Sex in Counterfeiters is
barren, not fertile. Currency is offered, given, stolen, but
ends as an inert artefact, 'worth nothing save in someone's
hand'.
Change, as a force, consumes itself, leaving behind an altered, but
restabilised status quo. The plot 'dies', but its effects are
lasting.
The
narrative ends with a final hope of establishing a new
equilibrium.
As in Romeo and Juliet, a new day dawns, bringing with it 'a
glooming peace'. The true effects of the play, one may hope as
a director, are felt by the audience.
text
copyright ©
2007 Tod Higginson
Tod Higginson has directed a number of short films, theatrical works
and radio pieces. The Counterfeiters' Tragedy was his first work as director on the
London fringe. He graduated with a First Class BA Hons degree in
Drama and Theatre Arts from Goldsmiths College, University of London,
in
2003. He has worked as a technical director on the London stage
and at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, and had audio work broadcast on
London's Resonance FM and the world wide web.
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