The Stage

The Man of Mode

Published Wednesday 7 February 2007 at 15:55 by Alistair Smith

Perhaps the greatest praise one can give Nicholas Hytner’s revival of this 1676 Restoration comedy is that at times one forgets it was written to lampoon an age other than our own.

So completely has he transposed the action to modern-day London and its hedonistic world of models, highly-paid footballers and poseurs that one could be forgiven for thinking it was written with them in mind.

Dorimant - in Etherege’s original a courtly rake - becomes a prancing player in the mould of Calum Best. Thanks to Vicki Mortimer’s spot on set design and new music composed by Grant Olding, his conquests revolve around the world of trendy bars, electonic music, boutique shops and ultra-modern bachelor pads.

Hytner mines the original text for issues which one might find in tabloid gossip pages - this is the world of indulgent high celebrity, where surface and pleasure are everything.

Many of the highlights are found in the supporting cast - Nancy Carroll’s hysterical lush Mrs Loveitt, Madhav Sharma’s domineering Indian father Old Bellair seeking a suitable marriage for his son and Bertie Carvel’s Medley - the wicked town gossip who doubles as Dorimant’s closest ally.

However, the show’s real scene-stealer is Rory Kinnear as Fopling Flutter, The Man of Mode of whom the title speaks (or is he?). Ridiculous in the extreme, his own exploits serve to remind us how little removed he is from the piece’s supposedly fashionable characters and Kinnear’s comic timing is superlative.

While not faultless - lines are occasionally swallowed and Hardy’s over-theatrical hand-waving seems unnecessary - this modern day re-telling, with relatively few textual changes, keeps the spirit of the original and holds Etherege’s mirror up to our own cracked society.