We know how it ends. Two men meet in a tunnel, one introduces himself as Gavrilo, and the stage is set for the prelude to one of the most significant episodes of 20th century history. But Rajiv Joseph's Archduke has little interest in historical reenactment. Instead, it reimagines the Serbian nationalist assassins as distinctly 21st century losers who can barely handle themselves, let alone a pistol.
Archduke’s real concern is the present. Princip and his co-conspirators are young and vulnerable down-and-outs, mesmerised by the rhetoric of the “captain”, a pompous nationalist played with scenery-chewing bombast by Marc Wootton, who convinces them that Austro-Hungarian hegemony is the root cause of their poverty and their consumption that has given them only a few months to live. The echoes of manosphere toxicity are unmistakable. The same dynamic of aimless grievance is harvested and weaponised through the prism of the past. Young men lacking existential purpose are handed a cause that flatters their self-pity into what they are told is a kind of destiny.
But once the subtext is established, the play loses momentum. Much of the second act orbits Gavrilo's claim that he is haunted by a dead woman who has committed suicide. The last remnants of his conscience are soon snuffed out by the captain who dismisses her, and all women, as witches. Perhaps we are just more clued up over the dynamics of manosphere misogyny, so don’t need signposting about how easily nationalist sentiment and patriarchal woman-hatred sit hand in hand. Originally written in 2017, its subtext has only become taken on greater pertinence as moral panic about young men has blossomed. There’s a strong case for it being ahead of its time, but that might be a disadvantage.
Despite the seriousness, Joseph relies on well-trodden comedy tropes to leaven the tone. The men squabble and fight like toddlers, which sits innocuously against Es Devlin's slick set, a fully realised tunnel complete with a working train to ferry them to Sarajevo. Any sense of conspiratorial paranoia is bathetically diminished by Joseph’s insistence on finding Three Stooges like slapstick wherever he can. Most characters boil down to stereotypes. Sladjana, the Captain's geriatric maid, teeters into frame with a dessert tray just to disrupt the captain at his most verbose moments, has wondered in straight from a morally questionable 1970s sitcom. Director Lyndsey Turner never quite achieves the Herculean task of balancing the tonal u-turns.
Despite its unevenness, the play earns its place. Most theatre that tackle male radicalisation descends into finger-wagging polemics. Archduke trusts its central conceit to do the work. We already know that Gavrillo Princip will pull the trigger. The question is how ordinary the assassin might well have been.
Archduke plays at the Royal Court until 25 July
Photo Credits: Helen Murray
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