Rajiv Joseph's absurdist comedy Archduke, now playing at the Royal Court Theatre, offers an amusing but light exploration of the radicalisation of young men. The play focuses on Gavrilo Princip, the 19-year-old Serb activist who assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand in 1914, triggering World War I, along with his comrades Trifko and Nedeljko. These starving, virgin consumptives are portrayed with a dream-like quality in this 2017 work from the Pulitzer-nominated creator of Bengal Tiger in the Baghdad Zoo.
A Whimsical What-If Scenario
The play ends with a whimsical speculation: what if the boys had abandoned their assassination plot and instead gone for a sandwich or met women? While this airy speculation could apply to any historical narrative, the play seems oddly insubstantial given its weighty subject matter. However, it remains enjoyable in Lyndsey Turner's production, which features deliberately overblown performances and one of the best sets in ages by Es Devlin—a segmented, curving tunnel with Third Man-style shadows and a section of an ornate railway carriage.
Characters and Performances
Stanley Morgan plays Gavrilo as a boyish, blokeish figure sent by his doctor to find purpose in life after a tuberculosis diagnosis. Chris Walley's Nedeljko, with an Irish accent, shares the same story and lung condition. Abraham Popoola's Trifko fails to inspire or intimidate them, even with his handmade bomb. The charismatic Captain Dragutin Dimitrijevic, played by Marc Wootton, is a fruity, extravagant figure reminiscent of Withnail's Uncle Monty, who bamboozles the boys with tales of Austro-Hungarian decadence and a gruesome account of disembowelling a traitor Serb king.
Dark Humour and Symbolism
The Captain wins the boys over with feasts from his aged cook Sladjana (Janice Connolly), who may be a wise crone or a witch. At one point, she feeds them cherries in brandy that may or may not be kitten livers. The play's odd attitude toward women is evident: the boys idolise absent mothers and are half-fascinated, half-fearful about sex, more enthusiastic about Sarajevo's sandwiches than its brothels. The suggestion that terrorism and toxic masculinity could be solved with a good shag feels reductive, but the production's restless energy and strange symbols—a dagger, a giant cake, a sweaty sack of roots—keep it engaging.
Production Details
Turner's production has the energy of REM sleep, with evocative fairground music for dulcimer and hurdy-gurdy heightening the nightmare mood. The Captain's rhetoric is ornate and poetic, contrasting with the young men's blunt, unrooted speech. The play runs until July 25 at the Royal Court Theatre. For more information, visit royalcourttheatre.com.
