Gaslight: No cop this time around

We caught the play Gaslight at Parramatta’s Riverside Theatres this week.

It’s a modern adaption of the 1938 thriller set in 1880s London and written by the British novelist and playwright Patrick Hamilton.

It’s a rather dark tale about a husband who tries to drive his wife insane in his quest to find some missing gems.

Hamilton wrote the play during a dark period in his life.

Six years before he was hit by a drunk driver and dragged through the streets of London, leaving him with a limp, a paralysed arm, and a disfigured face.

Two years later, Hamilton’s mother took her own life.

Premiering at the Richmond Theatre in London on December 5, 1938 before transferring to the Apollo Theatre in the West End on January 1, the play closed after six months and 141 performances.

But it has endured through an impressive list of incarnations, most notably Five Chelsea Lane (1941 American play – renamed for Los Angeles production), Angel Street (1941 American play – renamed again when Los Angeles production transferred to Broadway), and Gaslight (1958 Australian television play).

Angel Street was also a hit on Broadway and remains one of the longest-running non-musicals in Broadway history, with 1295 total performances.

Gaslight has also been adapted to the big screen as two films, both entitled Gaslight—a 1940 British film, and a 1944 American film directed by George Cukor, also known as The Murder in Thornton Square in the UK.

Both films are considered classics in their respective countries of origin, and are generally equally critically acclaimed.

The 1944 American version received seven nominations at the 17th Academy Awards, including Best Picture, and won two, Best Actress (for Ingrid Bergman) and Best Production Design. In 2019, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.”

The play also gave rise to the expression “gaslighting” which involves psychologically manipulating others into questioning their own sanity.

This latest adaption stars Geraldine Hakewill and Toby Schmitz, as Bella and Jack Manningham, and is touring Australia as we speak.

The original play included the character of a police inspector who solves the mystery, but this time around the inspector has been dropped, and the protagonists are left to sink or swim.

As the story unfolds we find Bella Manningham, a good looking young woman who is leading a comfortable life in a nice upper-middle class home, with a housekeeper and servant to wait on her — Elizabeth (Kate Fitzpatrick) and Nancy (Courtney Cavallaro).

Her husband, Jack, dotes on her, but disappears each evening, supposedly to conduct business meetings at the club of which he is a member.

After he has gone, Bella hears strange sounds and the gas lights dim for no apparent reason.

Is Bella imaging it or is there something more sinister going on?

You might recognise Hakewill from her television appearances which include Ms Fisher’s Modern Murder Mysteries, Wakefield and Wanted — for which she was nominated for a Logie.