Terry Johnson’s Hysteria is a mindfuck. And with the words ‘mind’ and ‘fuck’ kicking off this review, Hysteria could only ever be about Freud.
Hysteria sees the hugely influential and controversial master of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud (Sir Anthony Sher) perched on his chair in his Swiss Cottage office, dying of cancer and trying to rest, but even in his last days, impatient and preoccupied. Disturbed by a knock on the French windows, he sees a young girl (expertly played by Lydia Wilson) in a trench coat, drenched with rain, who seems at first to be a persistent nuisance, then something of an endearing mystery, and slowly, as we come to realise, Freud’s worst nightmare, symbolising all his repressed memories and fears.
Without giving away too much, Jessica’s not just there as a keen student desperate to meet her academic idol. As if her presence wasn’t enough of a distraction for Freud, he also has to endure being berated for his latest thesis by his physician, Yahuda (David Horovitch), who also manages to snag the all-important joke about a Freudian slip (the slip in this case being a rather risqué negligee). And with the three of them darting about in an elaborate game of hide and seek, in comes one more person to make the formula even more ridiculous: Salvador Dali (Adrian Schiller) in a pinstripe suit, mincing about with hilarious mispronunciations and a vat of grease in his hair.
All four actors on the stage at the Hampstead Theatre
Dali’s preposterous arrogance and thick Spanish accent brings comic relief to the heated and haunting debates between Jessica and Freud, as the painter poses trouser-less and in billowing boxers on a chair stroking his ridiculous moustache. Nearly every action he performs in his posturing manner results in uproarious laughter from the audience, whether it’s lying dramatically on the floor or uttering yet another posturing sentence about how he calls out his own name during sex. Or even coming half-naked out of the closet – ironic, really, for a play about Freud.
The entertainment and laughter invoked by Dali, and indeed Yehuda, both popping in and out of the room like pantomime figures, are entirely necessary – because without the farcical element of the play, it would be simply terrifying. Terrifying because whether you believe in Freud’s theories or not – and much fun is poked at them throughout the play, as Jessica rolls her eyes in disbelief at his well-known theory of penis envy – the fact is that just as famous case study patients like Little Hans repressed their fears, desires and memories, so do we all. A ghoulish scene at the end, which could have been silly in any other play, was truly horrifying as a physical manifestation of all that we try to repress – but that bubbles, disturbingly, beneath the murky surface of our minds.
Sir Antony Sher brings humour and poignancy to the complex character of Freud, who is simultaneously exhausted, guilt-ridden and curious as to these strange and sudden developments in his house. I last saw him in Arthur Miller’s Broken Glass, which also centred deeply on psychoanalysis and was set around the same time as Hysteria – in the midst of frightening change in Europe, Kristallnacht preying on everyone’s mind – and in both plays, Sher convincingly juggles the fear of the persecutory outer world with the blurring of reality and fantasy in his domestic world.
Sir Antony Sher as Sigmund Freud
An added dimension of intimacy is added by the mentions of Swiss Cottage, North London and Hampstead – Freud lived, after his move from the rapidly changing Vienna, in the very corner of London that the Hampstead Theatre is located in. In both the location and the unpleasant truths, it is as if we are living Freud’s world with him. Whether you have read all Freud’s case studies or you’ve never heard of Jung: be warned, you will be psychoanalysing yourself all the way home.
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Filed under: Culture, London, Theatre Tagged: culture, Freud, London, play, Review, theatre
