The Dumb Waiter at Hampstead Theatre review: a clenched curio
Alice Hamilton’s rigorous production of this early 50-minute two-hander by Harold Pinter shows the debt owed to him by Quentin Tarantino. In a shabby basement, two suited hitmen bicker about banalities while waiting to kill someone.
They talk about food, personal hygiene, sport, making it all the more shocking when conversation turns to their trade, particularly the way a female victim “spread” when they shot her. Sound familiar?
Gus (Shane Zaza) is nervous, fiddling with his shoelaces and fretting about tea. Ben (Alec Newman), his superior, is uptight and aggressive. Their dialogue is inspired by music-hall byplay, but in Pinter’s hands a debate about whether you light the kettle, or light the gas, becomes something more menacing.
The tension is further ratcheted up by the absurd demands for exotic restaurant dishes sent down to them by persons unknown in a ‘dumb waiter’ delivery lift. James Perkins’s set arguably overdoes the sense of oppression, suggesting the basement sits at the foot of a concrete silo.
The Dumb Waiter marks an early flowering of Pinter’s style, and Hamilton serves it well, but she’s a victim of unfortunate timing. This show was poised to open, marking 60 years since the play’s UK premiere at what was then the Hampstead Theatre Club, when the first lockdown hit. The two original actors withdrew and it was recast and rehearsed under social distancing.
Back in March it would probably have seemed an intriguing curio, a small gem amid what promised to be a year of theatrical riches. Now, as one of a small but concerted rash of openings before Christmas, the play itself looks a little meagre.
There’s a reason why The Dumb Waiter is usually paired with another early play like The Room to bulk it out. Hamilton’s revival also arrives just a year after Jamie Lloyd’s pretty much definitive version with Martin Freeman and a superlative Danny Dyer, as part of his Pinter at the Pinter season.
Still, you admire the effort and the will it took to get this terse clenched fist of a play put on at all. And any live theatre is welcome right now. Hamilton is an impressive talent – she directs all of Barney Norris’s plays – and I look forward to what she does next, with something that has more meat on its skeleton.
To Jan 16, hampsteadtheatre.com
