Doctor Faustus – Lazarus Theatre Company / Southwark Playhouse, London

A review of Doctor Faustus in a production by Lazarus Theatre Company at the Southwark Playhouse. Visually impressive and with great performances, Marlowe’s moral tale comes eerily to life.

Doctor Faustus

Even if you haven’t seen Doctor Faustus on stage, you may be familiar with the outline of the story. Faustus, a scholar at the University of Wittenberg, is convinced he knows everything. Maybe he’s right, he seems to have read all the books. Bored and arrogant he calls upon the Devil (who sends Mephistopheles), offering up his soul in exchange for 24 years of unlimited knowledge, wealth and power. For a smart guy, not such a smart guy, right? Because that pact feels very different to Faustus at the end of those 24 years than the start.

Since this story was first written by Christopher Marlowe in 1589 it has remained popular, and has inspired later authors including Goethe. The character’s hubris plays just as well with a modern audience as it did with an Early Modern one. Plus there are a number of fun other-worldly scenes that lend themselves to creative retellings.

Lazarus Theatre Company’s first production of 2022 takes Marlowe’s blank verse and gives it a contemporary skin. The adaptation, by director Ricky Dukes, comes in at around 95 minutes. There’s room for several choreographed appearances by a host of demons, while still exploring the key elements of the story and giving the actors and the verse ample space. The modern setting hasn’t significantly altered what Lazarus try to do with their Faustus, but the result is visually imposing.

A Deal With The Devil

The thing about the character of John Faustus is that we know from the outset where his story is going. Redemption is good and all that, but you can’t sell your soul to the Devil and not face any consequences. Particularly in Marlow’s time, the appearance of angels and demons and a host of spectral happenings would have been an expected outcome of his diabolical action. One of the sparks of genius in Marlowe’s play is that the audience find themselves titillated by demonic goings on, safe in the knowledge that an appropriate ending is coming in which Faustus will get his comeuppance.

All this is to say that there are some great opportunities within a work like Doctor Faustus. Opportunities which Dukes and Lazarus have seized with both hands. There is a first bewitching scene demonstrating Mephistopheles’ powers, which the company execute as a tightly choreographed dance number. The actors get to show off their vocal range a little later in a parade of the Seven Deadly Sins, to great effect. With jarring green paint over their mouths, the troupe of demons adapt and reform as a papal audience, a demonstration of the solar system, figures from history, and an anonymous horde from hell. The absolute commitment from the actors adds to the spine-tingling sense of something unnatural, something sinister. For me, as you can tell, these scenes were a real highlight.

This is not to detract from the performances of the leads, particularly Jamie O’Neill as Faustus and David Angland as Mephistopheles. O’Neill is a Lazarus Associate Artist and regular, last seen as King Herod in Salomé. His Faustus is intelligent if arrogant, taking great care in delivering his lines to greatest effect. This role requires great commitment and energy, and O’Neill demonstrates both as he guides his Faustus from his beginnings as a petulant scholar to his fearful end. Angland (also with previous Lazarus credits) is a good foil, dripping with sarcasm and disdain as he dedicates 24 years to damning this soul by doing Faustus’s bidding.

A Contemporary Skin

Let us come back now for a moment to the production’s excellent design. As I mentioned earlier, I saw the contemporary setting as a skin. What I mean by this is that the story wasn’t greatly altered by bringing the set and costumes up to date (unlike Antigone for instance, which we saw earlier in the week). It allowed a few amusing plays on words and some more recent cultural references, but Faustus is still Marlowe’s Faustus. The main benefit of the choices in set, lighting and sound design is that they are all top notch, and unconstrained by trying to achieve a strictly ‘period’ production.

To begin with Sorcha Corcoran’s set, a busy wall of magazine clippings and string is offset by a simple stage and furnishings. This backdrop, as well as being a good representation of how chaotic unbridled knowledge must be, ties together the antiquated text and contemporary setting. Surely a lot of work but really very clever. It works well with Stuart Glover’s strong and ever-changing lighting, and Sam Glossop’s very effective sound design. The whole comes together extremely well. For instance a dialogue-free opening scene, with O’Neill and Stefan Capper traversing the set, bathed in light, establishes from the outset the universality and inevitability of the tale that is about to unfold. Simple yet effective.

A couple of weeks remain in Doctor Faustus’s run at the Southwark Playhouse. Get yourself along there and prepare for an evening of demonic entertainments and the tale of one man’s soul, lost to hubris in the pursuit of power and knowledge.

Salterton Arts Review’s rating: 4/5

Doctor Faustus on until 1 October 2022