Mrs Warren's Profession

 Bath Theatre Royal

No-one says the word "prostitute". No-one says madam, or pimp, or brothel-keeper, or sex worker. But by the end of Act I, no one is in the slightest doubt as to what Mrs Warren's profession actually was. She made a lot of money out of it: paid for her daughter Vivie to go to college. The local Vicar was a previous client, and may be Vivie's father. Vivie is now dating Frank, the Vicar's hopeless son. Everyone agrees that this is quite out of the question, but can't quite say why. It's all very messy. 

One can see why the play isn't often revived. It was thought shocking in Shaw's time, and banned from the English stage for a decade. Modern audiences aren't likely to be shocked by the idea of sex-work, or indeed, by the word "prostitute". (At one point, Vivie writes down the "two words" which describe her mother. I can't actually work out which two words Shaw has in mind.) But there is a frankness to it which is still a little disarming; particularly coming from a woman of sixty. Mrs Warren is a little ashamed -- at least embarrassed -- by her work, but refuses to say that there is anything wrong with it. Frank may not want to marry Vivie purely for her money, but he is certainly aiming to marry where money is. And Mrs Warren's business partner, Crofts, who also proposes to Vivie, is quite clear that he is offering a financial proposition: he is rich, and likely to die first and leave her a legacy. (He could also be her father.) There's not, we are asked to believe, much difference between respectable marriage and Mrs Warren's profession. 

In Act II, Vivie confronts her mother; and her mother tells her story. It is one of those scenes only George Bernard Shaw gets away with: she talks for a quarter of an hour, maybe six pages of text, with minor interjections from her daughter. She was very poor; one of her sisters died of poisoning in a lead factory; she was cleaning glasses in a bar for less than a shilling a day; her surviving sister was wearing a fur coat and sleeping in a warm room. So she went into the same business. There is not that much else for a poor woman to do if she doesn't have "a turn for music, or the stage, or newspaper writing". It's an astonishing tour de force by Caroline Quentin, underlining the old adage that a tragedian can never do comedy but a comedian can do whatever she likes. One didn't feel one was in the middle of a monologue, so much as that this story was unfolding: although by the end I was perhaps more impressed by the actor's skill than the character's predicament.

It's these kinds of monologues which makes Shaw unfashionable compared with Ibsen and Chekov.  There's much dialog and some wit, but a lack of dramatic climax. Vivie (Rose Quentin) finds out what her mother has done, and why she did it; and unexpectedly forgives her. The mother/daughter bond is restored. (Caroline Quentin and Rose Quentin are convincing as mother and daughter because, er, they are.) One almost feels that the play could have ended there. But in Act III, George Croft (Simon Shepherd) reveals that his business with Mrs Warren involves running "hotels" all around Europe. No longer on the game herself, Mrs Warren is now a brothel-keeper. Vivie could forgive the former, but not the latter. There is the barest hint that Vivie disapproves of her mother "trafficking" vulnerable girls, which would give the play a contemporary resonance, but this isn't really the point. She can condone prostitution for economic necessity, but can't accept her mother continuing to make a living out of it now she is comparatively wealthy. 

Caroline Quentin is breath-taking and her daughter is more than adequate. I think that the play could have been quite heavy if played purely as satire; but there is enough of the comedic battle axe to Mrs Warren to offset the melodrama and sentiment. Shaw instructs the actress to lapse into cockney ("the dialect of a woman of the people") as she tells her story, Quentin keeps this subtle; we're a good distance from Eliza Doolittle. The rest of the cast are really foils, but they carry it off very well. Frankie does that turn-of-the-century thing of talking lower-class slang with a posh accent ("she ain't so handsome"), uses "ever-so" as an all purpose descriptor and baby-talks his "Viv-ums"; so it's a credit to Peter Lossasso that he comes over as a mostly likeable comedic master-of-ceremonies. His relationship with his reverend Dad (Matthew Cottle) counter-balances the Mother/Daughter trauma at the heart of the play. 

The original text of Pygamalion ended with everyone saying "good evening" politely and vacating the stage; Shaw added the famous "she's going to marry Freddy!" exclamation in a later edition (and even later allowed the movie to have a romantic happy ending). One feels that Mrs Warren's Profession would have benefitted from a similar revision. Mrs Warren finds Vivie in her London office -- she is studying "actuarial calculations" -- and confronts her, making a histrionic speech about daughterly duty and wondering who will take care of her in her old age. Vivie is having none of it, and sends her away. "And now I'd better go" "Will you shake hands?" "No thank you" "Goodbye". Vivie cries for a second and gets on with her work. One somehow feels the dramatic climax took place before the intermission. 

Vivie says that the poorest woman in the world still has a choice "She may not be able to choose between being Queen of England or Principal of Newnham; but she can choose between ragpicking and flowerselling, according to her taste." In the end she chooses to leave her mother and make her own way in the world by remaining single and studying. But her good school and her (pretty unusual) Oxford maths degree were paid for by her mother's profession. Shaw's dramaturgy may sometimes be a little of its time, but the endless flow of challenging ideas certainly keep you on your toes.