失落的远不止爱情
这篇影评可能有剧透
《蔚蓝深海》是英国著名剧作家Terence Rattigan 最为著名以及最为私人化的作品。说其著名是因为此作品曾经多次被搬上银幕和舞台。而说其私人化,个人化,是因为此剧的背景是作者的男友曾于1946年用煤气自杀。而这个事件成为了此剧本的序幕。
这部剧的剧情并不复杂。讲的是一个已婚中年女人Hester(Helen McCrory饰),在战后与年轻的前皇家空军飞行员Freddie(Tom Burke饰)相识于法官丈夫 William Collyer(Peter Sullivan饰)和她在桑宁戴尔度假时,并一见钟情,于是义无反顾投入了年轻的情人的怀抱并与他私奔后,当Hester和Freddie发生了情感危机时,面对情人的逃避主义和丈夫的挽回如何抉择的故事。这看似是一个充满“三角恋情节”的后“娜拉出走”的故事。
事实上《蔚蓝深海》确实与女性的自我意识觉醒有关。剧里的Hester曾经嫁给第一个向她求婚的人,爱上了第一个向她眨眼的人,并且为了后者放弃了15年的婚姻生活,放弃了位高权重,体面文雅的丈夫,反而选择了一个"粗俗不堪" 落魄的前飞行员,并且在明知道自己得不到任何情感上的回报,只为了年轻情人时不时的地给她他的肉体而选择了他。这一点足以说明了女性的“欲望觉醒”。此外,当情人决定抛弃她,独自前往遥远的南美洲后,面对丈夫的挽留,她果断拒绝了。当临行前情人向她展现温存试图请求她挽留自己,她坚定了独自一人生活的信念。这同样体现了女主自我意识的觉醒。
然而除此之外,我们不能忽略本剧悲伤的基调——那一抹弥漫全剧的混沌而深蓝的烟雾。我想我们更加好奇的是这种悲伤和忧郁从何而来。
也许,我们不得不应该回归故事的原点,回到剧作家写这部剧的契机,那个自杀的男友身上。泰伦斯•拉提根的男友自杀于1946年,这正是二战结束后不久。正因如此,我们也许可以把目光放在战争对个人的影响上。战争(各种灾难)可以摧毁一切,包括一个人的精神和肉体。同样从这一点剧中也可见一斑。首先对于Freddie而言,他的人生停在了1940年代。他曾经在试飞中找寻到了人生价值,或者为自己营造了一个避风港。然而战争结束,他的人生变得毫无意义。因为习惯了喧嚣与刺激后再回归平静很难让人接受。于是他从飞行员,一个战争英雄变成了一个试飞员,他迷茫,他逃避,他追求法官之妻出于心底的嫉妒,他颓丧,他开始酗酒,他沉湎过去而不愿意面对现实。从而为他和Hester的情感危机,埋下祸根。
战争,放大了人们对悲痛的感受力。战争增加了命运的随机性,面对突如其来炮火和司空见惯的死亡,战争,给予人们重新思考人生的契机。因为经历过战争的洗礼,女主重新找到了自己真正被吸引的人,战争使女主更加果断选择了能让自己拥有激情的人。然而这又增加了未来的不确定性。一方面战争过后使情人失业和变得颓废抑郁失去了对人生以及对生活的热爱与追求。另一方面女主在“自我意识”觉醒中抛下过去的一切去追求精神上的真我。在这样两者的不平衡间,女主放不下对情人的精神上和肉体上的依恋而情人在努力的回避女主热烈的情感。显然女主的真实需求不能在情人上得到满足。这正是女主爱情的矛盾之处,精神和现实的差距,以及当下的我和梦想中的我间的挣扎。正如女主认为自己夹在海洋与海平面见的无奈。
然而女主一直明白自己想要的是什么。Freddie的出现仅仅为她提供了一个做出选择,离开过去的舒适环境,创造属于自己的新生活的契机。而且身处昏暗的深蓝间的女主,也会看向窗外的日光,追寻片刻的自由。即使基调是忧郁的,然而女主从来不放弃找寻光亮的内心,即使再痛苦,也不忘了在最后为自己做一块三明治,含着眼泪将其吃下。
总之,这部舞台剧远不止是失落的爱情将何去何从。也不只是关于阶层,性别,和她或他的情感纠葛。这部剧讲的是女性的独立意识觉醒和选择的故事,关于一个女人的重生。我想这也是作者对男友的愿望。
写于2020.7.9,晚
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2020.7.14
无意中读到了海伦姨(Helen McCrory)为了National Theater at Home项目写的一篇感想。里面阐述了她对女主的动机和女主和飞行员为什么相爱,以及外部环境对人的影响和本剧所寄托的关于作者对男友的夙愿不谋而合。可以作为我的内容补充。附原文如下:
Terence Rattigan received a telegram one afternoon, while having tea with a friend. He read the telegram, went quiet, folded it, gave it to his friend and said, “Read this and then burn it.” The telegram sent him the news of Kenny Logan’s suicide, by gas poisoning. At the time, suicide was illegal, as was homosexuality. Kenny was Terence’s lover of ten years and he knew that the police would be arriving at any moment to investigate, which they did. A few days later, he told a friend a new play was forming in his mind. It was going to start with a body underneath a blanket by a gas fire, and it was going to be called The Deep Blue Sea. I played that body under the gas fire, Hester. The play takes place over a day. You meet her lover, Freddie, played by the brilliant Tom Burke. You meet her husband, played by the equally brilliant Peter Sullivan. Her landlady and fellow tenants including a German doctor and by the end of this day you understand why, when this character wakes, she describes herself as, “caught between the devil and the deep blue sea.” I think Rattigan explores everything he imagined his lover was going through in this play: a profound sense of shame, anger and hopelessness. Hester has fallen in love with a man she feels can’t love her back in the same way she loves him. She, we discover, is a failed artist, who has run away from her marriage. She is unable to become a mother. But despite of all this unhappiness, Rattigan saves her at the end of his play, in a way that I am sure he would’ve wanted to save Kenny. Hester finds the strength to go on despite having no sense of purpose or hope, by just putting one foot in front of the other and walking on. So, Rattigan suggests, in that moment of hopelessness, when she can’t find a reason to live, Hester somehow finds a way to keep living anyway. Tom Scutt designed the skeleton of a building, a London boarding house, in which everybody could be overheard and in which everybody could see each other. All the way through, on this set, you could hear, as you performed, the other actors walking up and down the stairs. I think all of that really adds to Hester’s sense of shame. I think that when you feel shame, you feel that everyone can see it; everyone can see what a failure you feel you are. Lighting and sound created the outside world beyond the boarding house, which broke through in a sharp, discordant way. The set was washed through with the colours of the deep blue sea. It was an almost expressionistic set. During rehearsals, I kept thinking about the original audience for this, which would’ve been post-war Britain, when people were walking around with physical injuries from fighting and bombing, veterans of the second world who maybe would’ve found it difficult to understand why someone would take their own life, when they had spent years fighting to stay alive. But on the other hand, they’d perhaps be able to empathise with Hester’s sense of exhaustion and feeling of purposelessness. I think it’s an extraordinary play because of all of those things. Before the play, every night, I would listen to Amy Winehouse’s song ‘You Know I’m No Good’. I thought Amy had a sensuality, a fragility and a vulnerability but with a real beauty, that I wanted Hester to have. So enjoy the production. If you can, I know the government has given the arts a fantastic hand, but if you can donate, please do, all help is very very gratefully received and if you can’t, thank you for reading and enjoy the show. Helen McCrory, July 2020
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Helen McCrory 已于英国时间2021年4月16日因癌症去世,终年52岁。其丈夫与北京时间4月17日凌晨发布了其妻子的讣告。Rest in peace Helen。