Stage adaptations demand fizz over fidelity

I was too young to have read the novel or seen the film that won the adapted screenplay, director and best picture Oscars in 1970. But in my 20s, I marvelled at the then uniquely sour, sad portrait of New York hope and hustling in Midnight Cowboy and have never seen it since. And the only thing I knew about going to Bryony Lavery and Francis ‘Eg’ White’s new musical version at Southwark Playhouse was that I wasn’t going to rewatch the film first.

What would be the point? I cannot imagine any other audience member would do such homework, and reminding myself of the Oscar-nominated leads or the actual locations would only diminish my connection to the stage. If you want to see how faithful something is, check the original out afterwards. Either a stage show works on its own terms or it doesn’t.

With all adaptation, the question of fidelity is central. How far do you go? A leaden-footed retread is a waste of every­one’s time and, crucially, money. And merely transferring material from screen/page to stage misses the vital point: the success of the original is down to having matched content with the perfect form.

I still regret not catching the 1936 Pride and Prejudice adaptation I Have Five Daughters

And when faced with source material that has been adapted (too) many times, another question needs asking: why? Take the Faust legend. There are dozens of tension-free versions of the tale of a man who sells his soul to the devil and then, after a couple of hours of debauchery, gets his entirely predictable comeuppance. Do we need another? Sorry, no.

Despite a game Jude Law, the 2002 Young Vic production was (I’m being polite) less than engaging. More recently, Jamie Lloyd came a cropper with a production led by Kit Harington, plus Jenna Russell singing Bat Out of Hell. That, according to most critics, went too far in the opposite direction.

Next up is The Great Gatsby. My fingers are crossed for the Broadway musical version opening here next week, but past adaptations don’t augur well since Gatsby is far stronger on shimmering prose and metaphorical intent than plot, and plot is what tends to drive stage adaptations. Even the opera at the Met in 1999 with America’s top-drawer opera talent couldn’t emulate, let alone animate, Scott Fitzgerald’s classic. But before you dismiss me as jaded, I concede there are exciting exceptions.

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