The devil and the deep blue sea

‘Few dramatists of this century have written with more understanding of the human heart.’ Says who? Britain’s Guardian newspaper. Of whom? British playwright Terence Rattigan, who died in 1977. Risteard Cooper certainly agrees, to a degree, with that assertion. He vividly remembers how the movie The Browning Version, based on Rattigan’s The Winslow Boy, “totally gripped” his heart when he originally saw it on TV.

Not surprisingly, Risteard is just as impassioned when he speaks about his role in the Gate Theatre’s upcoming version of Rattigan’s work, The Deep Blue Sea, in which he plays ‘a dashing ex-fighter pilot.’ Furthermore, it is particularly apparent that, as we speak during rehearsals he is still embroiled in the process most actors relish – namely, burrowing into the soul of his character to try to find its centre.
“It is a process I adore because it’s a journey of exploration,” he explains. “Usually, I have read a play so well and so often before I take it on that I would be pretty shocked if I found myself lacking during the rehearsal period. On the contrary it is probably the most enjoyable aspect of it all because it is the time you analyze the script, to try and get everything you can out of the text. And this is the beginning of that journey because we’re in the second week of rehearsals so I’m still finding out what makes the character tick, why he appears to be so miserably unhappy. He’s not miserably unhappy throughout but he goes through a difficult patch and the arc of the character is happy-go-lucky, a dashing fighter pilot. People like him were very much heroes of their time who diced with death and came out the other side.”
Yes, but then this guy dices with love, which is perhaps even more dangerous than dicing with death as a Spitfire pilot! In the play, he has a love affair with the leading character, Hester Collyer.
“He does, indeed, and it’s something he’s not really capable of,” says Cooper. “He doesn’t really have the language or the psychological make-up to deal with the relationship after the war. And, in a lot of ways, the play is an examination of how war effects people’s minds and their capacity to love and to be loved. In his case, it probably is a result of his being a hero for such a long time and having always had the ability to put on his uniform and go into the local bar and be able to pick up women and ditch them whenever he likes. This time he’s involved in a relationship and he finds he doesn’t have the facility to take on, and be responsible for another person. He is able, eventually, to express himself, when he is forced to and, in a sense, this relationship he is having with the Ingrid Craigie character involves him being mothered and cared for. She is desperately in need of this relationship and, actually, a lot more damaged, arguably, than he is.”
Even though exploring the character in rehearsals can be the most fulfilling part of this particular journey for an actor, playing the part night-after-night also has its challenges and rewards.
“During rehearsals the challenge is not deciding that the character is this, that or the other, because that can lead to a two-dimensional portrayal,” he opines. “Then, during the run, the challenge is to make it as fresh as possible and not just something you are repeating every night.”

The Deep Blue Sea opens at The Gate On April 15.