Theatre

Enid Bagnold’s delightfully fragrant drama opened in 1956, the same year as John Osborne’s radical ‘Look Back in Anger’. While Osborne’s play put a new class of people on stage, Bagnold’s eccentric comedy of manners is concerned with the upper classes as was traditional in the West End. It is set in the conservatory of ex-colonial Mrs St Maugham, who advertises for a companion to look after her grand-daughter, Laurel. The girl has been noisily going off the rails – ‘My case is practically in Freud’ – ever since her mother got remarried. The mysterious Miss Madrigal applies, who has no references but is, to Mrs St Maugham’s delight, an expert in gardening.

Chalk gardens aren’t the easiest to cultivate and there are several characters on stage who have found their environment equally challenging, including Jamie Glover’s twitchy manservant who spent five years in prison as a conscientious objector. Until Madrigal’s arrival, the whole household was dictated to by the dying butler upstairs, who is the last of a species. His authority in gardening matters is challenged by the newcomer, who determines that Laurel should be returned to her mother.  

Bagnold’s play is no classic, but it is stuffed with brilliant aphorisms, and possesses an appreciation of the
mysteries of human behaviour. Is it possible that the once scorned pre-Osborne generation could yield up other surprises? Its biggest triumph, ably exploited by Michael Grandage’s production, is to provide two stonking roles: the vain, unpredictable Mrs St Maugham played by Margaret Tyzack; and Penelope Wilton’s troubled, forthright Madrigal, who is definitely an original. Both actors deserve a medal, but Tyzack, in particular, is a miracle of clarity, precision and relaxed delivery as she explores her character’s sometimes vicious treatment of others, alongside a cruel indulgence of her grand-daughter. She, too, is one of the last of her kind; a now rare species that needs to be cherished.