21/08/24

Summerhall (Demonstration Room), Edinburgh

Ezra Montefiore (Saul Boyer) is London’s most celebrated spirit medium and, with the help of his benefactor, Guppy (Laurel Marks), who keeps him solvent, he is plying a lucrative trade in London in the years following the First World War. But Ezra’s appetite for opium – plus his gambling addiction – have made life somewhat precarious for them both.

Then Ezra is approached by Prince Felix Yusupov (Lewis Chandler), whom Ezra knows from years earlier. Felix wants to contact his late brother, who was killed in a duel when Felix was little and Ezra agrees to help him. He also agrees to find a solution to a problem Felix and his wife, Princess Irina (also played by Chandler), have encountered after the tragic death of their first-born child.

But there’s a powerful sexual attraction between Ezra and Felix and, when Ezra compels Felix to assassinate Grigori Rasputin, in order to keep news of their affair from reaching the Russian Royal Court, Felix is powerless to resist…

In Defiance of Gravity plays fast and loose with history, combining a mix of fictional characters and real life ones, and the result feels somewhat muddled. Some of what we see here actually happened, but much of it is speculation – and the latter outweighs the former. And when the key scene of Rasputin’s murder takes place offstage – I can’t help wishing I could watch it rather than hear about it second hand.

What’s more, the promised magical elements of the play mostly come down to a brief and rather unconvincing spot of levitation. The piece depends largely on its impressive sound design to transmit a sense of the supernatural so it certainly doesn’t help that the all-too-real hammering of actual rain on the skylight of the Demonstration Room competes with it throughout.

Felix Yusupov is a fascinating historical character and Unleash the Llama Productions might want to bear in mind that, back in 1932, he sued MGM films after their production of Rasputin and the Empress alleged that Irina had been seduced by Rasputin. The Yusupovs received £25,000 in compensation (a fortune back then) and the result was that subsequently all films featuring real-life characters had to have that famous ‘all similarities to people living or dead’ disclaimer at the opening. Here’s hoping that Felix’s descendants are not litigious.

But I digress. In Defiance of Gravity is a challenging blend of fantasy and reality and whether it’s for you or not will surely depend on your views on the ethics of rewriting history. Interested parties have just a few more chances to attend the séance at Summerhall.

Fancy it? Knock once for yes and twice for no.

3 stars

Philip Caveney