Under A Black Flag - or what NOT to watch on the London stage

It's time for a midyear theatre recap, but Under a Black Flag deserves a special entry all its own. It's the least I can do for something that sucked three hours of my life bone dry.

I admit it. It was my fault. I picked the play. I was on a pirate high after giggling my way through Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (okay, it's not a great movie. But it's FUN. Fun is good.) and wanted more buckle in my swash.

This was not the play to feed my pirate fancy. If anything, this play should quelch any liking for pirates dead, dead, dead.

Under a Black Flag is a prequel to Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island. If there was ever an argument that copyright should be granted to the author/author's estate in perpetuity instead of the current lifetime plus 70 years, this is it. Poor Robbie, rolling in his grave at the terrible abuse his characters were put through.

Here, Long John Silver is imagined as the son of a charlatan street preacher who flaunts Cromwell's laws. When Cromwell himself witnesses the con artist Silver claiming he saved the Lord Protector's life (because Cromwell obviously had nothing better to do than walk the streets of London looking for old men who drop trou - yes, full frontal male nudity opened the play), he sentences Silver to impressment in His Lord Protector's Navy.

When pirates board the ship (as pirates do), Silver eagerly volunteers to take up the black flag. But when he claims to be a saint (!), he freaks out the Evil Pirate Captain who turns him into a slave instead.

When they make port on the pirate island of Rabat, Silver and his fellow slave, who is African, are forced to perform Hamlet (!) in front of potential buyers (because who wants slave physical labor when you can have slave thespians...) Only, oops! the pirates gave Silver and his friend swords that work, and they fight their way to freedom, with Silver accidentally running through his best friend (who had too much stage fright to perform with them and so was hiding in a really bad place. See, acting saves your life!)

Then someone takes the Sultan of Morocco's daughter hostage in the melee and Silver saves her life and the Sultan pleads for Silver's return. Only the Evil Pirate Captain is still freaked out by Silver claiming to be a saint and tries to kill him. But the other pirates, even more freaked out, demand that he and his thespian friend (now called Hamlet) get to live, and off they go to the Pirate parliament.

Oddly enough, for a place that has a parliament, the pirates are not very democratic - until Silver proposes an equal share in all the booty. This doesn't go down very well with Evil Pirate Captain, who is used to getting, well, the captain's share. The men vote to make Silver their captain (well, I'm assuming they did. The play was unintelligible in many spots to my still American ears). They then name him "Long" after the length of his penis (which we don't get to see, but Hamlet vouches for. Hmmm.)

After the intermission, the play became truly interminable. Silver now has a lovely wavy wig to cover the crew cut he had in the first half, and some lovely iridescent green billowy pantaloons. He's sleeping with Isabella, who is Evil Pirate Captain's niece/lover/object of obsession, but he really yearns after the Sultan's daughter. Evil Pirate Captain, looking somewhat the worse the wear, is angry that Isabella runs around with Silver, and Isabella is angry that Silver moons over the Sultan's daughter. Evil Pirate Captain and Isabella plot to capture Silver, but Isabella is actually plotting to kill Evil Pirate Captain. Evil Pirate Captain is successful, Isabella less so. She gets carved up off stage for her betrayal (lots of crimson splatters all over Evil Pirate Captain, and a knive he lovingly fondles.) Evil Pirate Captain then proceeds to torture Hamlet, aided by a comedy duo who sing songs about being bastards. Hamlet gets carved up off stage. Silver, after being strung up ala the crucifixion and ranting to his father/Father about being a saint (a plot point dropped during the second half until now), gets his finger sliced off on stage, and the ring meant for the daughter he so loves taken away.

Meanwhile, back in England, the captain of the ship upon which Silver was impressed finally returns. Silver let him live, but killed his son, and set the captain afloat with his dead son's body for company. In case you miss how the captain survived his first weeks at sea, he will refer to eating his son. Many times. Subtlety and subtext are far from this play's strength. The pissed off captain, having threatened Silver at the time with the death of Silver's wife and daughter, is now good to go on the threat. He carves up Silver's wife off stage, but the daughter runs away to look for dear old pa. Now the captain wants to go after Silver himself. Cromwell says, sure, why not, and throws him a toady to supposedly keep him in check.

Silver has gone a little mad since his torture and is followed around by the ghost of Hamlet (I repeat. Subtlety is NOT a hallmark of this product). A young, stroppy cabin boy shows up - why, it's Silver's daughter Anne! She keeps her true identity a secret, and no one questions her because she exudes sullen teenage 'tude all too well. Silver is still captain - because no one else wants the job, now there's a surprise - and the ship is becalmed. The ghost of Hamlet tells him that the next person to call Silver friend is the Jonah and needs to be thrown overboard. Funny enough, that might be the new cabin boy - but another pirate steps in and utters the fatal words first. Bye bye pirate. Silver also goes overboard, carrying a sack of potatoes claiming it is gold. The ship starts to move. There is nothing ironic or even logical about this scene, except that ghostly Hamlet has either a warped sense of humor or he really sucks at this supernatural message from beyond thing.

Silver tries to bury his sack his potatoes before hanging himself. The Sultan's daughter stops him (WHY? OH WHY? I'D BE OUT OF THE THEATRE FORTY MINUTES EARLY IF YOU WOULD JUST LET HIM DIE!) because apparently the Sultan doesn't mind his unveiled daughter talking to strange men in the garden. Wow! One smile from the Sultan's daughter and a couple of "Allah is Great"s and Silver has the will to live again! Curse you, Sultan's daughter!

Silver and his men decide to take the fight to Evil Pirate Captain, because, y'know, eventually you have to fight the man who enslaved you, killed your friend, killed your lover, cut off your finger and stole your ring. Eventually. About two and half hours after it was made painfully obvious that Evil Pirate Captain is a very bad guy (if all the killing & pillaging wasn't a clue, the actor playing him aped Alan Rickman in Die Hard), Evil Pirate Captain is killed. Hamlet is avenged (he was one mouthy ghost. Wonder why the friend who Silver killed waaaaay back before the intermission never haunted him? Oh well, no use applying logic to this story) and he and the Angel of Death improvise some scat as they sashay off stage.

Silver claims that whoever finds his ring (and finger, one supposes) will be his partner and split the booty 50/50 with him. Hey! What ever happened to equal share for equal pirates, democracy pirate boy?! Anyhoo, stroppy cabin boy finds it. Hey, it was her ring originally. But Silver won't let stroppy cabin boy keep it. He needs it for another purpose.

Which is, of course, to convert to Islam and take the Sultan's daughter as his wife. Okay, Silver spends 3/4 of the play declaiming about his love for his daughter and how he wears the ring as a reminder of her, only to put it on the finger of the first Sultan's daughter he marries? What, he couldn't find another ring in the booty - Evil Pirate Captain wore plenty of them - or use some of it to buy a new one? And she didn't mind getting some hand-me-down? Whatever.

Alas! Married life is not meant to be. Pissed off English captain finds Silver's boat. They fight, Silver surrenders. Pissed off English captain wants to kill Silver. Toady protests that the pirates are unarmed and to kill them would be, well, unsporting. Pissed off English captain kills toady. Toady, who up to now has had maybe fifteen lines - most of them, "Yes sir" to Cromwell - then gets a soliliquy about violence begatting violence, etc. etc. etc. A soliliquy. Like, five minutes of stage time for a minor character. Which he uses to beat us over the head with the Important Theme.

Pissed off English captain is about to kill Silver. Oh no! Storm comes up. Sultan's daughter washes overboard. Silver goes after her. Stroppy cabin boy survives the storm, picks up pissed off English captain AND her father (now missing a leg, of course, so he can have a peg leg in Treasure Island). Because no good deed goes unpunished, pissed off English captain kills stroppy cabin boy just after she reveals herself to her father. Silver then moans to the heavens. My husband and I exit.

Three HOURS this took. There were some nice bits of staging; the play made full use of being performed in the Globe, with its standing room of audience members at the foot of the stage. Some of the costumes were nice. And, um, that's about it.

Overall, this was one tonal mismash, with broad humor next to Grand Guignal horror. Oh, and songs. Yes, there are musical interludes. Not very memorable tunes, but singing does ensue. The playwright strove for Shakespearean sonorance in his speeches, but alas! His pen was more of the sort Master Thespian enjoyed. The actors did their best, but the material defeated them every time. They didn't have characters, just disjointed moments that when added up made no sense.

Stay away. Stay far away from this benighted play unless ye, too, want to suffer the curse of the numb bum and the hurting brain.