Nye @ National Theatre, London
Nye Bevan. Proud Welshman, Socialist, miner’s son, bringer of social change for all, father of the National Health Service, unfaithful spouse, antagonist, the ultimate caller-outer, keen reader and wordsmith, stutterer, beloved husband and friend.
Tim Price’s James Graham-like play explores the complications of Nye Bevan through an imaginative production overseen by Rufus Norris. Set within an NHS hospital, we follow Nye’s dreams of his past as he fights for life and death following a stomach ulcer operation. It’s very Powell and Presburger.
Clad in pajamas, Michael Sheen delivers a charming, charismatic performance as Aneurin ‘Nye’ Bevan. Sharon Small is marvellous as his wife Jennie Lee, an equal political powerhouse. Part of the play also touches on grief and sadness as we learn that Nye really wanted a family, Lee lost a baby and that they never really talked about it, grieved together, having undiscussed affairs instead. We only learn of his mourning from his beloved friend Archie Lush (Roger Evans).
We see him humiliated by a cruel teacher, determined to make him speak lines of poetry in class. His friend Archie intervenes and suddenly there’s a class revolution (literally and metaphorically) against the unbalanced harshness of the teacher, wielding oversized canes like a Richard III spider. The revolution doesn’t stop as Archie introduces him to the wonders of the library — where you can read any book any time for free — and if you don’t like it, put it back — and choose another one! The liberation of education, of word replacement, of working class self-education and improvement is joyously celebrated in a clever moment. Think Disney’s ‘Be Our Guest’ — but in the more refined atmosphere of shelves of books in a public library. Through the library he learns that he can speak, replacing challenging sounds with other words. He can also sound posh!
Equally revolutionary is how he and his friends achieve voice for all and local political power. Inspired by a book on the French Revolution and the communes, they read about constitutions and fight the establishment with clauses. Elected to local and national power, Nye is determined to stand up for ordinary working people and to challenge the established authorities at every turn. Which they need. It doesn’t make him popular, nor does hiding his charm guarantee romance. Filled with admiration for Jennie Lee, there’s a wonderfully bantery meeting in the Parliamentary bar and he smiles in his sleep recalling their meeting. Despite it all, they love each other and she longs to say so many things to him.
Unlike a James Graham play, there is a lack of nuance at points. Nye’s failings are explored with nuance. Churchill is firmly debunked and both Churchill and Chamberlain are ridiculed, turning into caricatures — this seems unfair, given that so many other characters get fullness. It is intriguing that during the Second World War, Nye kept questioning and quizzing, concerned about Churchill’s abilities and war policy, and even calling a vote of no confidence in the great man. It’s fashionable now to laugh at Churchill and the other revered leaders of the past — and maybe they need it, but they could have been allowed the same nuance as Nye, being just as mixed in character and actions. Inspite of this one sided writing, the staging showed Chamberlain’s pacificist dreams soundly and shockingly crumbling, and Tony Jayawardena was a tremendously charismatic Churchill. Nye against the posh tea drinking establishment can also be conjured in cliched forms at times.
The staging utilises NHS beds (and sometimes the patients in them), the song ‘Get Happy’ and video projections to create the cries of ordinary people who can’t access health care, and the hostile striking doctors resisting the NHS. We see Nye’s determination, but also his bravado, as he negotiates with the doctors — and wins! Rhodri Meilir does a great boiling apoplexy as a Councillor about to explode due to the minutiae of clauses coming against him!
Mining culture is celebrated too — we see Nye’s father educating him about the coal seam and the most effective way to mine. His father’s death haunts him — Nye was out of work for three years, supported by his at-the-end-of-her-tether sister Arianwen. Dying of black lung, a painful, choking, slow, drowning death, Nye avoids seeing his father, until forced into it — and then his father dies in his arms. Part of this poor health and safety and health care inspired him to fight for people nationally and unrelentingly push at those in power and privilege. In the year of the 40th anniversary of the Miners’ Strike, there’s a lot to reflect on here.
Equally reflective was the NHS nurse’s encouragement of warring, caring and concerned, wife and friend to speak to Nye as he lay dying, as the NHS was giving them more time with the man they loved. The value of dignity in palliative and end-of-life care was so clear here. Though the ending was bizarre as Nye’s consultant pulled lumps of coal out of his wound, and his miner father lit the way through the darkness.
Despite the flaws in the piece, I came away thinking about the importance of education and literacy, the power of miners and other working class groups who created night schools, attended night classes and purchased libraries to educate themselves, of how we’ve lost sight of the power of local and national politics as a means of doing good for all of the people, of benefitting others; of how important it is to be politically educated (we should know our constitutions!) The power and value of libraries! Inspite of his personal behaviour, how inspirational Nye Bevan was.
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