Play about violence

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 32805, 4 January 1972, Page 4

Play about violence

“Let’s Murder Vivaldi,” by David Mercer, is a positive play, about how people come to terms with violence and often use it to strengthen their relationships.

In screens from CHTV3 on Sunday night. Ben, a draughtsman in his late twenties, lives with Julie in a shabby flat in Camden Town. He is neurotically jealous and is tortured by the thought that she might be having an affair with Gerald, oan older man with whom she works in the Civil Service. Julie cannot bear his jealous rages any longer and warns him that if he makes another scene she will leave him. He does not really believe that she will go; this situation, has been repeated so often in the past, but when she does in fact make a move to leave, he slashes her cheek with a knife.

Gerald and his wife discuss the failure of their marriage in their comfortable, smart flat in St John’s Wood. Monica decides that they really must get divorced. She proposes that Julie should be the woman in the case, and that Gerald should take het away for the week-end. Gerald and Julie arrive at a hotel on the coast. They are both nervous and they become increasingly more ill at ease with each other and irritated. Finally, Julie decides that she cannot face the prospect of going to bed with Gerald and they return to London. Gerald faces his wife across the breakfast table. She taunts him about his failure with Julie and leads him to believe that unknown to him, she has been unfaithful for years. Gerald can suddenly bear it no longer. He picks up the breadknife, stabs her and telephones the police.