First published in 1957 by Faber and Faber limited: London.
First performance at the Royal Court Theatre, London. By the English Stage
Company. Directed by Tony Richardson. Décor by Alan Tagg.
Dramatic personae:
There are five characters in this play. I will describe the three most
important figures. That means I will not discuss Helena Charles and Colonel
Redfern.
-Jimmy Porter: He is the main character in the play. He is married to
Alison and lives also with his friend and colleague Cliff Lewis. He works with
Cliff in a sweet stall. In the third act Alison has left Jimmy and he lives
together with Helena Charles. At the end of act three Helena leaves Jimmy and
it seems like he and Alison get back together. Osborne describes Jimmy as: ‘a
tall, thin young man about twenty-five, wearing a very worn tweed jacket and
flannels’ ‘He is a disconcerting mixture of sincerity and cheerful malice, of
tenderness and freebooting cruelty; restless, importunate, full of pride, a
combination which alienates the sensitive and insensitive alike’.[1]
He expresses himself, his anger, through long monologues/tirades. Most of the
times directed to someone but he’s not expecting a (satisfying) answer.
-Cliff Lewis: He has his own room in the house but during the play he
is most of the time at Jimmy’s flat. Cliff is described as an opposite of Jimmy
in many ways. ‘CLIFF is the same age, short, dark, big boned, wearing a
pullover and grey, new but very creased trousers. He is easy and relaxed,
almost to lethargy, with the rather sad, natural intelligence of the
self-taught. If JIMMY alienates love, Cliff seems to exact it’[2]
-Alison Porter: Is the wife of Jimmy. Her looks are describes as ‘tall,
slim dark. The bones of her face are long and delicate. There is a surprising
reservation about her eyes, which are so large and deep they should make
equivocation impossible’[3]
She has the weakest character of the three. It always seems that she’s afraid
of Jimmy. During the play she becomes stronger. With the help of her friend
Helena and her father she leaves Jimmy at the end of act 2. At the end of act
three she makes it up with Jimmy. During the first two act she’s pregnant. In
the third act she looses her child and knows she can’t have children anymore.
Relationships
Jimmy and Cliff: Jimmy and Cliff are (work)mates. They share the same
opinion about a lot things and people but Cliff isn’t aggressive like Jimmy.
Sometimes he goes along with the tirades, other times he tries to weak the
judgements of Jimmy.
Jimmy and Alison: They live in two different worlds. In one world they
are a squirrel and a bear, fond of each other and protecting and caring for
each other. The other, the real world, Jimmy is constantly trying to provoke
Alison, by being rude and violent about her and her family. Alison appears to
be afraid and not herself when she’s with Jimmy in this world. For example she
doesn’t dare to say that she’s pregnant of him.
Cliff and Alison: The have a warm trustful relationship. Cliff tries to
protect Alison for Jimmy as much as he can as Jimmy falls out at her. That
already start at the very beginning when Cliff tries to protect Alison through
saying: ‘leave the poor girlie alone. She’s busy’[4]
He is also protective in other ways for example at page 13 of the play he says:
‘Why don’t you leave all that, and sit down for a bit? You look tired.’ This
goes on during the play. Cliff and Alison are quite close and cuddle and kiss a
lot. This is fine by Jimmy, he only jokes about it; ‘CLIFF: Why the hell she
married you, I’ll never know. JIMMY: You think she’d have been better off with
you? CLIFF: I’m not her type. Am I dullin’?’(…) ‘JIMMY: Why don’t you both get
into bed, and have done with it.’ [5]
Trama:
The act takes place in a one-roomflat in Midsland which belongs to
Jimmy Porter. The actors go on and off the stage to other places but these
places are not staged. It’s an attic room at top of a large house. The attic is
quite large. The furniture is simple and old. You can cook in the room but the
bathing room/toilet is in another part of the house. The room doesn’t seem very
organised. They really try to give the impression that people actually are
living in the room.
In the first scene is the room
described as a jungle of newspapers and weeklies.[6]
The play takes place in the present. The present is the postwar era.
The action develops chronologically but there are time ellipses between the different
acts and scenes. The play begins at an early Sunday-evening in April. The year
is not given, but it is in the present. The second act starts two weeks later
and in the second scene the following evening. The third act starts several
months later and ends in the second scene a few minutes later. Through these
ellipses the characters and the action can develop credible. Al action takes
place during evenings. Most of them are in the weekends.
I will give a summary of the play following the acts and scenes.
Act one
In the first act we get an introduction of the characters. It’s a
Sunday evening in April and Cliff, Jimmy and Alison are in the attic. Alison is
ironing, Cliff and Jimmy are reading the papers and are discussing them. Jimmy
is expressing his anger on the world and people in tirades. For example:
‘JIMMY: All right. They’re your ulcers.
Go ahead, and have a bellyache, if that’s what you want. I give up. I give up.
I’m sick of doing things for people. And all for what? Nobody thinks nobody
cares. No beliefs, no convictions and no enthusiasm. Just another Sunday
evening.’[7] He is
also expressing his anger by assaulting Alison and her family. Cliff tries to
intervene. At last when Cliff and Jimmy are fighting Alison get hurt by the
iron. After that Alison tells Cliff she’s pregnant. She doesn’t want to tell
Jimmy because she knows he doesn’t want the baby. At the end of the scene
Alison and Jimmy fall into their bear-squirrelact. A friend of Alison calls
that she is coming over to stay for a week. Jimmy gets angry again.
Act II scene 1
It’s two weeks later and Helena is still in the house. She is talking
with Alison about the way Alison met Jimmy at a party and how they got married.
All the problems they faced. Helena advises her to get away for sake of the
baby. They are having dinner. Helena comments the behaviour of Jimmy. After
dinner Alison and Helena are going to the church what causes another conflict
between Jimmy and Alison. Cliff and most of all Helena are defending Alison. Jimmy sees Alison going to the church
as a betrayal of him. Jimmy receives a phone call and goes downstairs. Helena
attacks Cliff for not defending Alison (enough). Helena tells Alison she has
sent a wire to her father to pick her up the next day. Alison decides to go
when he comes for her. Jimmy returns and says that Hugh’s (a good friend of him
who is abroad) mother had a stroke and is in the hospital. Alison doesn’t join
him to the hospital but goes with Helena.
Scene 2
The next scene takes place the following evening. Alison is packing her
backs and her father is with her. They are talking about Cliff, Jimmy and the
past. They apologise to each other for the things that have happened between
them. She compares her father with Jimmy. ALISON: You’re hurt because everything is changed. Jimmy is hurt because
everything is the same. And neither of you can face it. Something’s gone wrong
somewhere, hasn’t it?’[8] Helena enters and tells them she’s not coming
with them. Cliff enters too en says goodbye to Alison. He leaves the house too
because he doesn’t want to be there when Jimmy returns. When Jimmy returns he
reads Alison’s letter and tells Helena that Hugh’s mother is death. He is very
angry and upset. Helena tells him too that Alison is having a baby. He sends Helena
away (she doesn’t go) and hits himself in the face. In the end ‘His hand goes
up to his head, and a muffled cry of despair escapes him. Helena tears his hand
away, and kisses him passionately, drawing him down beside her.’[9]
Act 3 scene 1
The first act is being repeated. Only now Alison and her stuff is
replaced by Helena and her stuff. The same discussions on a Sunday evening.
First they perform some kind of vaudeville with the three of them. Later Helena
is attacked by Jimmy but the attacks
seem less violent. Cliff announces that he’s leaving. At the end of the scene
an ill looking Alison enters. Jimmy leaves at the sight of her.
Scene 2
Alison feels like an intruder but she wants to convince herself that
everything she remembered about the attic really happened to her. She had a
miscarriage and is now infertile. Helena realises that what she has done is
wrong. She explains Jimmy’s behaviour as someone who is ‘born out of his time’[10]
She calls Jimmy to the livingroom and says she is leaving him. Jimmy’s response
on this is: ‘They all want to escape from
the pain of being alive. And, most of all, from love.’ (…) ‘It’s no good trying to fool yourself about
love. You can’t fall into it like a soft job, without dirtying up your hands.’
[11]
Helena leaves the house, shaken. Alison wants to leave too but Jimmy starts
talking to her. He talks about the injustice she has done to him. Alison tells
Jimmy she has changed and that, while losing her child, she became the person
Jimmy wanted to see. ‘I thought: if only—if
only he could see me now, so stupid, and ugly and ridiculous. This is what he’s
been longing for me to feel. This is what he want to splash about in! I’m in
the fire, and I’m burning, and all I want is to die! It’s cost him his child,
and any others I might have had! But what does it matter—this is what he wanted
from me!’[12] Alison collapses at his feet and Jimmy takes
her in her arms. The play ends with their bear-squirrel-act, pitying each
other.
© 2004 A.N. van
der Plas