THE P RTAL
October 2014
Australia Pages - page 8
A view from Australia
Review of the play: “The Last Confession”
Australia
Pages
Speculation, fact or fiction? J T Stockman reviews
Roger Crane’s play about the Vatican 36 years ago
David Suchet
is an actor of renown. A Governor and Associate Artist of the Royal Shakespeare
Company, he has appeared in many stage plays and films, however, he is probably best known for his
portrayal of Agatha Christie’s detective Hercule Poirot, having played that character in the entire list of
Christie’s seventy four Poirot stories.
Pope Paul Vl and
Pope John Paul I
Having an appreciation
of his thespian art,
it was with a degree
of
anticipation
that
I
learned
of
his
scheduled appearance,
in Melbourne, in the
stage play “The Last
Confession”. Based on the
intrigues surrounding the
final years of Pope Paul
Vl and the election, short
Papacy and death of Pope
John Paul I, the story
unfolds as seen through
the eyes of Cardinal
Giovanni Benelli (Suchet), an influential reforming
theologian.
The large supporting cast, some twenty in number,
prove worthy of the scope and range of the story,
playing with conviction their various roles pitched
against the background of Mafia influences, implied
criticism of the Vatican, questionable financial deals
and political power struggles.
on the Church, as he sees it from his eminence, it is
pertinent to be reminded of events, not so long ago,
which appear to encapsulate a familiar situation in
posing the question - what if ?
As Roger Crane writes in the programme:
“For 33 days in 1978 a battle was fought for the
soul of the Catholic Church. In the end, because
of the untimely and suspicious death of John
Paul I, nothing changed.
Whilst the theme can be taken as an hypothesis on
Now, 36 years later, Pope Francis has begun that
circumstances, similar to the style used by Dan Brown
in his “The Da Vinci Code”, it poses queries, and battle again with all the entrenched powers, the
though it does not deliver definitive answers, provides Vatican Bank, the Curia and the powerful conservative
Cardinals that fought Pope John Paul I. An Italian
a more than interesting subject matter to ponder.
prosecutor said recently that hopefully Pope Francis
what if ?
will be given enough time to make his changes. We
In an era in which we are regularly bombarded with can only hope that he is given the time and has greater
news, theories and intrigues, implied and otherwise, of success”
political shenanigans in every corner and under some
beds, our minds are attuned to wonder, wander and
A superbly acted play conjectured on events over the
theorise. As Pope Francis now establishes his authority last half century within the Catholic Church.
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