Symbols galore

John Greally
AN EXCELLENT cast and a top-line director have pooled their wealth of talent to produce a new comedy at the Fortune Theatre that is full of mystifyingly unfunny jiggerypokery-mystifying because the author, David Pinner, has up to now turned out very good stuff.
At its simplest, Eanghorn is the story of a lesbian's conversion to straight sex. Fair
enough, but in the process the author lambastes his audience with a protracted barrage of sex symbols-from solemn demoustaching, to suggestive swordplay. No doubt, it all ex presses his anger at the current pre-occupation with sexual extravagances, but the play's own extravagance is just as nauseating.
One character is made.into a beautiful creation in spite of the play: grandpa, played by Sydney Bromley. Against the rest, his sly, timid, ruthlessly greedy approach to life is a breath of fresh air. And at one moment he makes a brilliant criticism of "Fanghorn" itself: "I've had enough of symbols."
Mary Land, as young Jackie King the teenager who is striving to find out what innocence is like, gives a performance that is charming and sometimes moving.