Review: Mrs Warren's Profession

Bessie Carter sizzles haughtily in her ‘splendidly modern’ role

It is difficult to see why Mrs Warren’s Profession – such an innocent play to our eyes now – was once banned, writes Michael Holland.

George Bernard Shaw’s play was written in 1893 and banned until 1925 but has been performed many times since. This production has all the ingredients for something great: the writer, the director Dominic Cooke, a cast that includes Bessie Carter, Robert Glenister and Imelda Staunton, and the wonderful Garrick Theatre. But the best thing about it is that Mrs Warren and her daughter Vivie are played by real mother and daughter – Staunton and Carter – who bring an authenticity to the work because – as it is already there – they did not have to find that relationship from within.

Vivie never knew who her father was and has been ‘boarded out’ for most of her life, hardly seeing her mother who has homes abroad and travels a lot for work.

On her own, Vivie has become a strong, independent woman, with a maths degree from Cambridge, who wants to make her own way in life and not live on the money put into her account every month by her rich mother.

Vivie prepares for a rare maternal visit by waiting in her mother’s English country garden where several men pass by to see the great lady’s arrival and – for some – approval for her daughter’s hand…

Mr Praed( Sid Sagar) has been sent on ahead to ensure Vivie is ready for her strong-willed mother’s return from overseas; Rev. Samuel Gardner(Kevin Doyle) is a nervous wreck, and his son Frank(Reuben Joseph) is a ne’er-do-well who has lost all his money and had his father’s savings to bail him out. He wants to get his hands on the Warren money with his good looks and reptilian charm, while old Sir George Crofts(Robert Glenister) has more than enough money and wants to use it to buy himself some young flesh in the form of Vivie Warren.

You would think the scene was set for the play’s narrative – Who wins or buys the hand of Mrs Warren’s daughter? But no, as the menfolk stake their claims on the young woman(who has no interest in any of them) with words in any ear that is open to their scheming ways, Vivie tells her mother her plans to work in Law in Chancery Lane and pay her own way. Mrs Warren tells her that she will not succeed in a patriarchal society and should live in the comfort of the money she made by being a sex worker with several successful brothels across Europe!

Shock and horror for Vivie, who now demands to know who her father is. Mrs Warren is not telling. But now the play has turned into a Mamma Mia plot where the daughter seeks to know who her father is. The audience are looking at this array of men and wondering who it could be…

But Lord Crofts, in his attempts to ruin other people’s chances of marrying Vivie, reveals who it is to take out a rival. A dastardly move.

But that is also not the story. Shaw’s play is about class and power; about the poor having to resort to prostitution through economic necessity rather then depravity, the lack of real opportunities for women and the wholesale hypocrisy of Victorian Britain, and the double standards of male privilege.

Bessie Carter sizzles haughtily and quite rightly takes this high-horse stance to look down her nose at Victorian sanctimoniousness in her ‘splendidly modern’ role.

Garrick Theatre, Charing Cross Road, WC2H 0HH until June 12th.

Booking and all details: https://thegarricktheatre.co.uk/