revew: Kneehigh – Brief Encounter
Brief Encounter/
by Noel Coward/
adptd Emma Rice/
dir Emma Rice/
Kneehigh/
The Lowry/
20-24/02/2018//
Alternative version of Brief Encounter: in which, as Laura runs out of the café in the climax, a woman called Thelma pulls up on the train platform in a 1966 Ford Thunderbird. She invites Laura into the car and she gets in, just as Alec arrives back on the platform. He has missed his train. The express can be heard approaching in the distance. Thelma asks Laura what she wants and Laura realises Alec has never asked her a question like that and meant it. “Keep going,” she says. Thelma asks Laura if she is certain and she says “Yes.” They kiss, then Laura steps on the accelerator and they ride the car off the platform into the path of the oncoming express.
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Alternative version of Brief Encounter: In which the initial encounter between Laura and Alec is interrupted by a bomb blast. The civil war has expanded beyond the edges of town and now the station is the site of a struggle for control over the route of the express train, laden with supplies. Laura and the café manager quickly negotiate with both sides to ensure the café remains a safe zone. Alec sets up a makeshift surgery after helping one young combatant who has taken shrapnel to his eye. The inhabitants of the café prepare to wait out the fighting until the struggle ends. The second half of the production is a courtroom drama: Alec is tried for treason after aiding enemy soldiers during the struggle. The allied soldiers he assisted testify on his behalf, but to no avail. Alec gives an impassioned speech, ending “If I am a traitor for preserving the life and dignity of my fellow man then, your honour, let me hang.” Alec is found guilty.
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Alternative version of Brief Encounter: In which the main plot is more than usually overwrought but the supporting cast are stubbornly bawdy and light-hearted at every opportunity, to the extent that their attitude becomes mocking and oppressive. Press describe the production as ‘astonishingly cruel’ and there is a record number of walkouts. The Morning Star describes the production as ‘a triumph of a production… the proletariat refuse to pander to the spoilt and immoral leads… a truly radical reimagining of a previously stolid and casually malicious piece of cinema history.’ The final scene sees both Laura and Alec openly weeping as they crawl to their waiting, separate train carriages, the chorus performing a ragtime rendition of U2’s With Or Without You.
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Alternative version of Brief Encounter: Laura and Alec meet after he removes a piece of grit from her eye. The two bond over discussing the “quite mad” behaviours of the base and provincial locals, and the eccentric café manager, who to their mind dresses “like a threepenny Marie Antoinette”. The manager’s son overhears their exchange and passes it on to the manager and together they hatch a plot for revenge. The next Thursday, they make a show of a high-quality fake china set the son has picked up from the market, appearing to nearly accidentally smash it multiple times. Alec and Laura, dismayed at the chance this seemingly-priceless china may be destroyed, fall for the bait and hatch a plan to steal it “for its own protection”. Meanwhile, the café manager informs the police of her concern and waits for the plan to come together. The officer on duty, however, is Laura’s husband, who agonises upon discovering his wife’s affair but lets the two off. After, their marriage quickly disintegrates and Laura and Alec elope.
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Alternative version of Brief Encounter: Laura and Alec meet in the station café, after Laura removes a thorn from Alec’s foot. They sit and share a pot of tea when there is a sudden crash, so violent a tremor that a wall of the café collapses, trapping Alec’s left leg under the rubble. The express train has derailed in the station whilst overloaded with the set and company of a travelling circus. The company and engineer have all perished but the circus’s animals survive and swarm the station. Laura fights off a lion with a broken chair leg but badly wounds her arm in the process. With his free arms, Alec crudely sutures the wound. Laura forages for supplies for Alec before she heads to town for help, but it becomes quickly clear her blood is poisoned. Help arrives and Alec is rescued but Laura’s infection is too far gone and she perishes. Alec keeps the body of the lion. He stands it taxidermied in his study in Johannesburg.
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Alternative version of Brief Encounter: After three weeks of their affair, Laura gives Alec an ultimatum; he must never see her again, or he must murder Laura’s “dreadful bore” of a husband. In exchange, Laura will dispatch his wife. Alec quickly agrees to the idea but later resolves to frame Laura for both murders. Unfortunately for Alec, Laura is also having an ongoing affair with the head of police and the whole arrangement is an elaborate plan to frame Alec for the attempted murder of both his wife and Laura’s husband. Everything goes to plan, culminating in a courtroom scene in which Alec is sentenced to death, with Laura and her husband nowhere to be seen.
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Alternative version of Brief Encounter: After their affair has been ongoing for several months, Alec reveals to Laura he has been offered a job in Johannesburg. In a lengthy final scene, Laura convinces Alec to leave his wife and move to Johannesburg with her. They live out the rest of their lives in luxury.