REVIEW: INFAMOUS by April De Angelis at Jermyn Street Theatre 7 Sept – 7 Oct 2023

‘Irresistibly comic and intelligent, Caroline and Rose Quentin give us a delicious double helping of Lady Emma Hamilton’ ★★★★

Lady Emma Hamilton, beat Madonna’s Vogue by several hundred years. While the pop singer was striking poses of “ladies with attitude”, Emma Hamilton was doing this over two centuries before. Her Attitudes, a sequence of staged movements and performed frozen images, to entertain dinner party guests and party goers conjured great women of the past, of myth, legend and religion including Mary Magdalene, Bacchante and Sibyl. With a flourish of her shawl, Lady Emma Hamilton’s Attitudes (circa 1770s) were scandalous and provocative.

To witness acting royalty, Caroline Quentin re-enact these ‘Attitudes’ in the new play by April De Angelis is to experience a moment of sheer comic brilliance. She performs alongside daughter, Rose Quentin, as they both take star turns as Lady Hamilton. Rose Quentin shines in the first half, during her youthful glory. Married to Sir William Hamilton, British ambassador in Naples, she is at the pinnacle of her power and fame: haughty, stylish, imperious, demanding, her humble beginnings and deserted daughter, born out of wedlock are consigned to the past. A feted celebrity and fashion icon, she gives lavish parties and seduces Horatio Nelson who becomes her lover and part of a ménage à trois. In this first half, Caroline Quentin plays her downtrodden mother, a Mrs. Mop in a broad Yorkshire accent, who attends to her ungrateful daughter's every need and tries to guide her with little success. She also carries her own dark secret.

In the second half of the play (1hour 45 with interval) the set design ingeniously transforms from gilded Neapolitan splendour to the rough, grey interior of a barn in Calais. Silky sheets are swapped with hessian and before a word is spoken, we understand Emma’s social position has descended somewhere into hell. This time, Caroline Quentin assumes the Emma Hamilton baton with the dejected demeanour of a former beauty gone to seed. Skint, drunk and destitute, she complains bitterly about the British government who denied her Nelson’s pension (and instead gave it to his brother). Rose Quentin plays her unfortunate daughter, Horatia (daughter of Nelson) hungry and desperate. The mother and daughter dynamic of the characters is underscored by this real-life mother and daughter pairing, which is inspired casting by director, Michael Oakley.

The rise and fall of Emma Hamilton is a perfect subject for De Angelis who through her plays has brought to life and given voice to women of the past whose voices are otherwise silenced or flatly interpreted by history. Emma Hamilton is a feisty, unrestrained, amoral character and were this a traditional morality play, the unfolding events would suggest divine retribution. But instead, audiences feel the lack of power and choices women had and how poorly Hamilton was treated by men and the patriarchal institutions. Nelson got his column for bravery in Trafalgar, but Emma Hamilton also lived her life bravely. An Irresistibly comic and intelligent production, Caroline and Rose Quentin treat audiences to a delicious double helping of Lady Emma Hamilton, a thoroughly flawed heroine and reinstated feminist icon for the modern age.

Photography: Steve Gregson

WORLD PREMIERE

Infamous

BY APRIL DE ANGELIS.

DIRECTED BY MICHAEL OAKLEY.

7 SEPTEMBER -7 OCTOBER 2023

Box Office https://www.jermynstreettheatre.co.uk/show/infamous/

Cast

Caroline Quentin EMMA HAMILTON (1815)/ MRS CADOGAN

Rose Quentin EMMA HAMILTON (1798)/ HORATIA

Riad Richie VINCENZO/JACQUES

Creatives

Michael Oakley DIRECTOR

Fotini Dimou DESIGNER

Christopher Nairne LIGHTING DESIGNER

Beth Duke COMPOSER & SOUND DESIGNER

Mandy Demetriou CHOREOGRAPHER

Brigitte Adela ASSISTANT DIRECTOR

Summer Keeling STAGE MANAGER

Morgan Toole ASSISTANT STAGE MANAGER

Reviewed by Nilgin Yusuf