Sweet Nothings

Sweet nothings: not far off what i took away from this play at the young vic, really. Adultery, naive love, hopeless yearning, promiscuity, teasing, decadence, flirting, betrayal, claustrophobic social expectation and decorum - such things are sweet whisperings, sure, but for me they amounted to nothing and i came away hollow, disappointed, unengaged.

It's turn of the century Vienna (though costumes are fin de siecle via topshop, and the first act's set has more than a dash of 1980s brashness in its 'slick' rather than stylish red and black decor), and four beautiful, decadent youths gather for a party. The privileged boys are in the dragoons, the less affluent girls copy musical scores and sew for money or look after their siblings. One boy, Fritz, is engaging in an adulterous affair, which he fears may be about to end/be exposed or challenged by the elder woman's husband. as the revelry becomes more drunken, sexually charged and raucous (unconvincingly if you ask me - cringingly there's nothing so excruciating to watch as a party scene that falls flat), the married woman's husband turn up and challenges Fritz to a duel.

The second half shifts to the flat of Christine, a party girl from act one and a girl hopelessly, genuinely in love with the dashing, socially superior Fritz (Tom Hughes, gorgeous and compelling scene stealing in Ricky Gervais' otherwise forgettable film Cemetery Junction, out April, but somewhat less charismatic here, sadly, oscillating confusingly between nervy adulterer and confident tease). In contrast to the lasciviously scarlet flat of the flirtatious and promiscuous Fritz, Christine's simple abode is pure and white, and rather than decadently living alone, watched over by no one, waited on by servants, she lives with her ineffectual violinist father, and every move is scrutinised by nosy, gossiping, puritanical neighbours (epitomised by Katherina, played by the fabulous Hayley Carmichael from Told by an Idiot). Fritz represents the glamour, daring, exoticism that is outside Christine's world, and more importantly, escape from it. sadly her affections are misdirected, and probably not deserved as Fritz is really just a bit of a cad. One who will disappoint her in the worst way, taking routine tardiness for their engagements to a darkly bleak limit.

Luc Bondy directs this 'sex tragedy', a translation of Arthur Schnitzler's 1895 Liebelei, and though it ends badly for all, i wasn't terribly moved, failing to be captivated or convinced by the initial hedonism, left cold by the strains of supposed genuine emotion and unthreatened by the looming shadow of death which hangs over the play, a punishment, presumably, for such sexual and loving excesses.