Triple triumph of performers, set and director

Photo: -Darren Robinson

HE NEEDS a haircut... and eventually he might get one from hairdresser Rita. Scarlett Brookes and Steven Elliott star at the Coliseum.

Educating Rita, Oldham Coliseum, to October 31

I’M not sure what can be said about Willy Russell’s play that hasn’t been said before, dozens of times, all over the world.

It’s that kind of play, not only universally popular but universal in its themes: the search for knowledge for its own sake, the longing for something else, the need of a haircut...

But it must be said this is a very good production indeed: two beautifully-cast, non-starry performers, a terrific set and a director who — whether by accident or design — has found the chemistry between the actors and pushed it to the hilt.

Actor and director Iqbal Khan returns to the Coliseum with a second triumph — the first being “Snookered” during the theatre’s out of body experience in 2012. Since then he has been heavily in demand and has worked with star names at the RSC.

But he clearly doesn’t need star names to draw out good performances. Scarlett Brookes as student and hairdresser Rita and Steven Elliott as lecturer Frank, both making their Coliseum debuts (as is designer Florence de Maré, who makes Frank’s office as fascinatingly dingy and unkempt as he is), have a great on-stage relationship that rarely looks like becoming a sexual one — which is exactly as it should be. At the start she is playful, direct and confident, in a nervous sort of way, while he is nonplussed and overwhelmed by this “different” kind of student.

As the evening goes on she starts to sink into student mediocrity — by choice — while he falls more than a bit in love with her, the only woman to pay him real attention. The attraction, of course, is mutual but for Rita, now Susan again, quite platonic.

What is even smarter here is that Khan goes for realism; there are few obvious laughs but a lot of quiet enjoyment.

“Educating Rita” is a fascinating and concentrated observation of a relationship and of regret: he regrets his failed career and life, she regrets her birthright because she sees better.

By the end both are on new, separate paths, him to Australia, her in a new life. We expect they will be okay.