The Collection

Acton Community Theatre
London W3

4/5

HAROLD PINTER’S The Collection opens with an anonymous 4am phone call to the Belgravia home of Harry, who flat shares with dress designer Bill. 

At that ungodly hour it is enough to put anyone on red alert. A death in the family? The police? A lunatic? 

In Pinterland we don’t quite know — it could be all or none of these. 

Instead, the caller turns out to be James (Mark Shaer) who, although not certifiable, is certainly mad about something as he reveals when he turns up at the flat. His wife Stella (Robyn Pinkney) has confessed to an affair with the youthful Bill (Lewis Morton).

As the play unfolds, we learn that Harry (John Dobing) is a much older and cultured man, in sharp contrast to Bill (Lewis Morton) who’s a bit rough around the edges. 

In a speech full of comic menace Harry taunts Bill, calling him his “slum slug with a slum mind.” Is this a homosexual relationship? Perhaps — it is left for us to fill in the details and if it is so, it raises the possibility that his wife is fantasising. 

James confronts Bill who denies everything but it later emerges they were both at the same hotel in Leeds at the same time and maybe a little canoodling did go on but nothing serious happened. Is Bill telling the truth or is he spinning James a line just for the hell of it? 

The audience is certainly led on and it is a hell of a ride in this production directed by Jack O’Connor where the emphasis is on Pinter’s humour more than his menace. 

The famous Pinter pauses, which in the wrong hands can lead to mannered portentousness, are pruned back. A lively evening is the result and this hornet’s nest of lies, sexual uncertainties and suppressed violence is certainly one to add to your collection.

Runs until November 15, details: actonw3.com

Michael Stewart