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Five Finger Exercise
The first stage success from the author of EQUUS and AMADEUS. This family drama centers on a young German student who, coming to England to tutor the daughter of a well-to-do family, is drawn into the various individual dramas of these fractured, isolated people.
98 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1959
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About the author
Peter Shaffer
70 books181 followersSir Peter Levin Shaffer was an English dramatist, author of numerous award-winning plays, several of which have been filmed.
See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Sh...
See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Sh...
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
October 27, 2012
First performed in 1958, this is a play of its time. I’m not sure the modern generation would understand the subtleties of the upper middle class family and its seething social and class tensions. The addition of the German tutor as a fulcrum for change, so short a time after the war, would nowadays not have the power and relevance it must have had for an audience of the day. Of course, those of my own generation, and earlier, would appreciate these factors, but whether the play could be enjoyed by a younger audience is open to debate.
In the written text, there’s an ambiguity surrounding the relationship between the tutor and the son that could hint at homosexuality. But the resolution of this in performance would be dependent on the actors playing those parts and the direction they were given, and I’m still unable to decide whether their attempt at friendship is platonic or subconsciously sexual.
Employing a girl developing into early womanhood as the object of the young tutor’s teaching, enclosed, as they are, in a tight and intimate setting, would now be seen through different eyes. In fifties England, paedophilia was a taboo subject and one not considered for public exposure or discussion as it now is. Again, the playwright may have had ulterior motives and may have been adding a layer of complexity to the plot by suggesting a sexual longing on behalf of the daughter. Certainly she develops a crush on her tutor, and this, once perceived by the mother, is a cause for the older woman’s jealousy, since she also fancies herself in love with the young man. But the crush may have been intended as no more than the sort of puppy love displayed by young girls for objects of devotion, without the sexual connotation it would inevitably acquire for today’s audience.
The relationship between the businessman father and the social climbing mother with artistic pretentions is almost clichéd, though here it is rescued from that fate by making the woman of French origin. The tensions formed by her sensitivity and his pragmatism, especially as these pertain to the raising of the son, are classic in their portrayal. The fight about his education at university, studying English Literature, instead of taking the route of practical apprenticeship in his father’s furniture business, is so well drawn that it may well be based on the author’s own experience. I don’t know whether that’s the case, however. This sort of conflict, where the mother wants her son raised to appreciate the finer things in life and the father wants him to be moulded into his own image in order to carry on the business, is a fairly common element of fiction and drama or the era.
This is a play about class war, the then prevalent theme of the war between the sexes, prejudice regarding nationality, and the ever-present conflict between those who make money and those who merely spend it. Whether it would work for a contemporary audience I couldn’t say. Certainly, however, if it were to be performed locally, I’d attend. As a study of the times, this is an excellent example of drama, and, given the pedigree of the creator, is as well written as you’d expect. I enjoyed it.
In the written text, there’s an ambiguity surrounding the relationship between the tutor and the son that could hint at homosexuality. But the resolution of this in performance would be dependent on the actors playing those parts and the direction they were given, and I’m still unable to decide whether their attempt at friendship is platonic or subconsciously sexual.
Employing a girl developing into early womanhood as the object of the young tutor’s teaching, enclosed, as they are, in a tight and intimate setting, would now be seen through different eyes. In fifties England, paedophilia was a taboo subject and one not considered for public exposure or discussion as it now is. Again, the playwright may have had ulterior motives and may have been adding a layer of complexity to the plot by suggesting a sexual longing on behalf of the daughter. Certainly she develops a crush on her tutor, and this, once perceived by the mother, is a cause for the older woman’s jealousy, since she also fancies herself in love with the young man. But the crush may have been intended as no more than the sort of puppy love displayed by young girls for objects of devotion, without the sexual connotation it would inevitably acquire for today’s audience.
The relationship between the businessman father and the social climbing mother with artistic pretentions is almost clichéd, though here it is rescued from that fate by making the woman of French origin. The tensions formed by her sensitivity and his pragmatism, especially as these pertain to the raising of the son, are classic in their portrayal. The fight about his education at university, studying English Literature, instead of taking the route of practical apprenticeship in his father’s furniture business, is so well drawn that it may well be based on the author’s own experience. I don’t know whether that’s the case, however. This sort of conflict, where the mother wants her son raised to appreciate the finer things in life and the father wants him to be moulded into his own image in order to carry on the business, is a fairly common element of fiction and drama or the era.
This is a play about class war, the then prevalent theme of the war between the sexes, prejudice regarding nationality, and the ever-present conflict between those who make money and those who merely spend it. Whether it would work for a contemporary audience I couldn’t say. Certainly, however, if it were to be performed locally, I’d attend. As a study of the times, this is an excellent example of drama, and, given the pedigree of the creator, is as well written as you’d expect. I enjoyed it.
March 6, 2014
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 6, 2015
Can't say I loved this. I know it's early Shaffer, but it feels really dated, very much of the '50s domestic melodrama breed--warring parents, family division, resentful children, sensitive outsider becoming collateral damage.
February 26, 2014
One of the finest, darkest plays I've had the pleasure of reading.
February 25, 2015
Tense, intense and amazing. I may or may not be in love with Clive.
Edit: I cannot give this a five anymore after reading Shrivings. I am sorry!
Edit: I cannot give this a five anymore after reading Shrivings. I am sorry!
May 16, 2022
This hovers between 3-4 stars, another slushpile script - in this one, Shaffer doesn't overshoot the exoticist mark as in Royal Hunt of the Sun, nice tightly focused bourgeois middle-class English family plus the well-meaning German tutor whose presence upends the [miserable] balance they had. Okay, now I'm going to talk plot, so go away if you want to, like, be surprised by the plot of a 70 year old play.
>>>"SPOILERS"<<<
Walter is German emigre tutor for 14 year old Pamela, in acquiescence to mother Louise's French pretensions over father Stanley's rags-to-middling-riches plainness. Clive is the 19 year old son who is most fully caught in the middle of the parenting war. (Huh, it suddenly occurs to me: this is kinda "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" only there are real children involved.) What I really want to say is, with clever directing, this could be a gay play, because there is insinuation right at the end re: Clive/Walter. Really everyone [Louise, Clive, Pamela] loves Walter, which alienates Stanley, but then they turn on him just as much [Clive stretches the truth of what he sees and tells Stanley he saw Louise and Walter en flagrante delicto, Louise makes Stanley fire Walter because she think he and Pamela are too chummy, and Clive tries to get Walter to quit, maybe mostly out of guilt that he's already framed him for an affair] and the poor guy is just trying to live some life of disavowal of his Nazi family back in post-war Germany.
>>>"SPOILERS"<<<
Walter is German emigre tutor for 14 year old Pamela, in acquiescence to mother Louise's French pretensions over father Stanley's rags-to-middling-riches plainness. Clive is the 19 year old son who is most fully caught in the middle of the parenting war. (Huh, it suddenly occurs to me: this is kinda "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" only there are real children involved.) What I really want to say is, with clever directing, this could be a gay play, because there is insinuation right at the end re: Clive/Walter. Really everyone [Louise, Clive, Pamela] loves Walter, which alienates Stanley, but then they turn on him just as much [Clive stretches the truth of what he sees and tells Stanley he saw Louise and Walter en flagrante delicto, Louise makes Stanley fire Walter because she think he and Pamela are too chummy, and Clive tries to get Walter to quit, maybe mostly out of guilt that he's already framed him for an affair] and the poor guy is just trying to live some life of disavowal of his Nazi family back in post-war Germany.
June 10, 2018
Short play (100 pp. or so.) Unpleasant English couple locked into a "battle royale". Children (adult now) are the victims but the biggest victim is the young German tutor they hire for their daughter. Held my interest but at times overwrought dialogue and a bit dated.
November 19, 2016
151. Five Finger Exercise by Peter Schaffer
I found this play disappointing and dated, but this may be my personal bias. In some ways all the characters have found the material goods that were found in Plenty, but like that drama, none is ever satisfied. The family has bought a country home, and have decided that the daughter should be taught by a tutor rather than be sent to school. The tutor, Walter, a sensitive young German refugee, becomes a target for the four family members. Walter and the teenage daughter, Pamela, are sympathetic characters, but the other three, Stanley, Louise and Philip, are almost stereotypical members of the upper class and irritating. I also found this very dated and some of the dialogue stilted. I just remembered that this was made into a movie which set the action in California. Even Rosalind Russell as Louise didn’t save it.
I found this play disappointing and dated, but this may be my personal bias. In some ways all the characters have found the material goods that were found in Plenty, but like that drama, none is ever satisfied. The family has bought a country home, and have decided that the daughter should be taught by a tutor rather than be sent to school. The tutor, Walter, a sensitive young German refugee, becomes a target for the four family members. Walter and the teenage daughter, Pamela, are sympathetic characters, but the other three, Stanley, Louise and Philip, are almost stereotypical members of the upper class and irritating. I also found this very dated and some of the dialogue stilted. I just remembered that this was made into a movie which set the action in California. Even Rosalind Russell as Louise didn’t save it.
June 6, 2013
Read with Portland Playreaders
April 17, 2017
An old play about a dysfunctional family & the way they operate.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews