A Methuen Playscript from my youth is always a fun find. This is extra special in that it's a one-acter from 1965, originally staged by the RSC at the Aldwych as part of a programme called Expeditions Two.
I never considered David Mercer to be either experimental or absurdist, but The Governor's Lady is both. Lady Harriet Boscoe is the widow of Sir Gilbert, governor of an unnamed African territory on the verge of seeking independence. Unexpectedly, Gilbert returns. His manners have deteriorated somewhat. He now feasts on bananas, smashes crockery for fun, and demands sex. He has, indeed, reverted to being a gorilla.
It is a one-acter, lasting perhaps half an hour. But it is in seven scenes with quite complex changes in between. Yet Mercer, an emerging playwright at the time, handles the stagecraft with astonishing flair. That is all very well, but what stood out for me was the way he can evoke emotion in such a crowded format, whilst juggling issues of colonial racism which (we should remember) were still controversial in 1965.
In it's small way, The Governor's Lady is a mini masterpiece that would still be worth putting on today - though I doubt we could find two such perfect characters for the leads as Patience Collier and Timothy West.
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