Left – Jeanette Cronin. Photo – Richard HedgerFasten your seat belts; you’re in for a helluva ride, as Jeanette Cronin reprises her role as Bette Davis in Queen Bette, a return season of last year’s smash hit sell out celebration of one of Hollywood’s enduring icons.
Exploding onto the stage in a rage full of expletive and hell hath no ferocity, Cronin channels Davis with a dichotomy of personal diatribe and dialogue from the movie, Elizabeth and Essex, the film in which she first essayed the role Queen Elizabeth I of England.
The great ire of that production, according to Queen Bette, was the casting of Australian actor Errol Flynn as her co-star. She wanted Laurence Olivier for the part. Yet it was another Australian, costume designer Orry Kelly, who salves her outrage, his wardrobe created for the picture fostering a fondness.
From this fixture we flashback to a precocious child determined to be in show business, at first as a dancer, later as a dramatic actress, inspired by a performance of Peg Entwistle as Hedwig in The Wild Duck. The importance of that inspiration is embodied in a prop, a wooden duck, which also symbolises the superstitions inherent in the theatre and adhered to by thespians.
In simple, clear, precise and defined staging and performance, Davis’ personal and professional life is superbly chronicled – early auditions, first love, the intercession of George Arliss in her stalling film star career, of her mother, Ruth’s, stubborn and unwavering support of her, and of her warring with Warner Brothers.
Juz McGuire’s lighting design is illuminating not just in the practical sense of letting the audience see the action of the performance but by creating a cinematic palette running the gamut of wide shot to close up.
Devised by Cronin and Peter Mountford, and produced and directed by Mountford, Queen Bette is an enthralling entertainment.
Cronin is a theatre magician creating an acting alchemy. From the opening scene, her physiological resemblance to Bette Davis is striking, but as the narrative evolves, the resemblance ratchets to remarkable, exceeding mere impression, exalting in a reincarnation. This is an enchantment by talent and technique, something Bette Davis toiled for, and Cronin has crafted. Bette Davis may have found her Australian co-star, Errol Flynn, flawed, but would certainly be floored by Jeanette Cronin’s towering and triumphant tribute.
Spooky footnote: Bette Davis character in the 1931 Universal motion picture, Waterloo Bridge, is named Janet Cronin.
G.bod Theatre presents
Queen Bette
Directed by Peter Mountford
Venue: Old 505 Theatre @ 5 Eliza | 5 Eliza St, Newtown NSW
Dates: 24 March – 8 April 2016
Tickets: $35 – $25
Bookings: old505theatre.com
