Hearing the words ‘don’t leave after the first half’ from the production team and cast of a play would more often than not be a sign of trouble. However, rather than a plea of desperation, the team behind Oleanna, this term’s Corpus Week 3 Mainshow are uttering a defence of a play clearly close to their hearts.

Perhaps unusually for a show, director Emma Hall was the last amongst her cast (consisting of Charlie Parham and Charlotte Hamblin) and producer Will Cartwright-Harwood to have read the play, but David Mamet’s work, concerning the potentially inappropriate relationship between a university professor and his female student, clearly captured her.

‘Mamet is not done enough in Cambridge’ Hall believes, excepting last Easter’s production of Sexual Perversity in Chicago at the ADC. The attraction to putting on his play comes from an interest in the rhythm and pacing of his writing, as well as the ability to work on accents, which does not happen when working, as Cambridge theatre does so often, with Pinter, Shakespeare and Stoppard.

Interestingly, Pinter directed the first British production of Oleanna. Hall observes there are some clear differences between their writing styles. However, ‘Mamet is much faster in tempo’. As a result, rehearsals of some particularly fast sections proved to be quite difficult.

Having seen Sexual Perversity last year and being unconvinced of its relevancy on the Cambridge stage in 2011, all four do convince me of Oleanna’s urgency to this particular audience.

In fact, this particular play has been labelled the most misogynistic of the last century, which Hall attributes to this production being the first time it has been directed by a woman since its premier in 1992.

Moreover, for Hamblin there is a topical element regarding the current state of higher education. Studying Education with Drama and English, the academic line Parham’s character John takes on education is one to which she is accustomed. Hamblin and Hall are familiar with the relationship between gender and power in a learning context as both are yet to have a female supervisor. One of the initial staging ideas was for the events of the play to take place in a supervision room, lending itself to an intimate Corpus setting.

Hall hopes to direct again, insisting that ‘all theatre is worth experimenting with’ but would not necessarily work again with actors whom she knows; all three were keen to work together on Oleanna, believing that having a pre-established relationship between them would provide a good basis for finding performances that brought out the characters fully.

The team suggest that their production will encourage the allegiances of the audience to shift during the course of the three acts. This will be a probing, potentially uncomfortable experience, one surely not be missed. l Oleanna will be showing from Tues 7th-Sat 11th February at the Corpus Playroom