Shaking all over

PERIOD OF ADJUSTMENT
Almeida

BY 1960, when Period of Adjustment opened in New York, Tennessee Williams could look back on being the poetic and passionate voice of the American theatres.
The US in the mid-1950s was emerging from its involvement not only in World War II but also in Korean between 1950-3. All appeared stable. A baby boom of church congregations was rising and housing was affordable. All seemed cosy and comforting as apple pie.
America had achieved its indissoluble identity once again. It is Christmas Eve and Ralph Bates (Jared Harris) is sprawled out with a can of beer. The TV blasts out Frank Sinatra’s Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas – an acid irony on what follows.
Ralph has been in both wars with his buddy George Haverstick (Benedict Cumberbatch). George arrives, dumps new wife Isobel and drives off. Lisa Dillon is the apparently unconsummated bride. We learn this gradually. Mrs Bates has fled with her two children because Ralph has quit his job. George returns armed with champagne and he and Ralph greet each other with boyish boisterous affection. He too has become unemployed.
Mike Britton’s split set is a sterile bedroom above the living space. George rages repeatedly, uncontrollably shaking. This is moderated by alternative displays of affection and anger towards Ralph.
The house shows cracks because it has been built over a cavern and shakes violently when a tremor occurs. Ralph lives up to the biblical injunction blessed are the peacemakers for he tries to calm the turbulent newly weds by repeating: “It’s a period of adjustment.”
Dorothea Bates (Sandy McDade) returns to the crumbling house to retrieve the children’s presents but decides to stay when Ralph gives her a beaver fur coat as a Christmas present, going broke in the process.
This is where Williams produces rich laughter. Lisa Dillon is a delightful Marilyn Monroe and Jared Harris keeps impressing by continuing to convey human emotions
Cumberbatch’s yearning to start a cattle ranch” is a welcome respite amid his sporadic outbursts bordering on spontaneous combustion. Sexual congress with Ralph is abated by a severe tremor – the house shakes.
Williams, looking at a complacent and self-satisfied society, could see the cracks as plain as in the Base’s ramshackle house.
Four stars out of five.
Until April 29
020 7359 4404