Accidental Death of an Anarchist
Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith, until April 8
The relationship between the police and the public has seldom, if ever, been more precarious. More than 90 officers and staff were found guilty of crimes last year, including the former officer who kidnapped, raped and murdered Sarah Everard.
This profoundly disturbing state of affairs makes Tom Basden’s update of Dario Fo and Franca Rame’s Accidental Death of an Anarchist all the more relevant. It takes as its starting point the death of an anarchist who has either fallen or been pushed from a fourth-floor police station window while under interrogation.
A local showman known only as the Maniac – played by Daniel Rigby – is subsequently arrested and brought into the station for questioning. He takes the opportunity to lead the police a merry dance and, in the process, exposes how institutionally sick the force has become.
Daniel Raggett’s production is frantic but also very funny. It’s as if Joe Orton had written an episode of The Bill. Rigby delivers a performance of mesmerising intensity as the Maniac and he is ably supported by Shane David-Joseph, Tony Gardner, Ruby Thomas and Howard Ward as coppers of varying seniority.
Fo and Rame’s original work was based on the death of a real-life anarchist called Giuseppe Pinelli while being interrogated by the Italian police following the Piazza Fontana bombing in 1969. Back then, corruption seemed to be the unique preserve of foreign police officers. It’s nothing short of terrifying that Basden has managed to shift the action so effortlessly and convincingly to a metropolitan police station in this country.
