Performance: The Judas Kiss

Maidment Theatre

Review: Susan Budd


Love and betrayal are the themes of David Hare's play, which subjects two days in the life of Oscar Wilde to intense scrutiny. The first is the day in April 1895 when he must decide whether to face arrest for what was then the crime of homosexuality or flee the country. The second is two years later at Posillipo, near Naples, the last day he spent with Lord Alfred Douglas (Bosie) for whom he became a martyr to love, suffering imprisonment and the penury and disgrace that hastened his death at the age of 46.

The play opens explosively with an extraordinarily beautiful and explicit scene of sex between a young maid and manservant. The ecstasy of love is also torment, as she stands spreadeagled as if crucified in the climax of passion. The religious motif is extended in Wilde's last supper, a sumptuous luncheon seductively described by hotelier Sandy Moffatt, played with feeling and delicacy by Ross Duncan. The second act charts the slow, dying fall of disillusionment. It is static and exceedingly wordy. And it is here that the peculiarities of the casting are thrown into sharp relief. Wilde was a big, sensual man with huge generosity of spirit. Raymond Hawthorne's performance is sharp and tight. Wilde's deep sadness that erupts in moments of flashing anger he plays as snide repartee, bitter and bitchy, so that Bosie's betrayal of him seems perfectly understandable. Daniel Gillies' Bosie is no epicene flower of the aristocracy, but a butch young man little in need of the fatherly arms of his lover.

Acting honours go to Craig Parker in his portrayal of Robert Ross, whose devotion to Wilde never faltered. He plays a dull man with integrity and grace.