January 19, 2023
You Are Here at Southwark Playhouse: A Pleasant Surpriseby Randi / May 27, 2021PEOPLE! Can you believe it? For the first time since March 14, 2020, when we saw Uncle Vanya in the West End and the guy behind me coughed a bunch and we realized ‘oh this is bad’ (the spectre of disease, not the play; the play was incredible) (and then I had covid – was it from him? we’ll never know (just kidding I know it was you asshole)), we were back at a LIVE FORKING SHOW in person in a theatre! Well not ‘in’ – our first show back wisely took place in an outdoor amphitheatre; we’re not crazy! Gimme that wind if I’m around other people! But wow, can you imagine how excited I am? I LOVE THE THEE UH TUHHH.
I wonder if the excitement of being back would have made me enjoy even a bad play, but we will never know because Official Return Show was quite an impressive little treat. ‘Adventures with the Painted People’, by David Greig, is a four-hander (you remember how I changed the terms to make them accurate?) that tells of a Roman officer named Lucius who gets kidnapped by Picts. It’s 2000 years ago and Romans have taken over, killed all the good Pictish men, ruined everything as invaders do for native peoples. When a group of Pictish boys find the stray Roman by the water, they knock him out and bring him to their tribe’s witch, Eithne, to be a sacrifice, naturally.
For someone being tied up in a witch’s ‘house of the dead’ which is really a cave of the dead which is much worse, Lucius never seems too angry or upset. Nicholas Karimi’s portrayal is really likeable, and you’re like aw I hope he doesn’t get sacrificed. He writes insubstantial poetry, but you can tell he feels more dreamy than the rigidity of a Roman officer’s life would normally allow. And that makes for a good pairing with Kirsty Stuart’s Eithne, the Pictish version of a manic pixie dream girl if ever there was one. (Manic pictish dream girl OH MY GOD.) She’s full of energy and conversations with spirits and flowery language, compared to the Roman’s straight lines. And yet, as she tells her captive, she wants his help to become Roman, so that she can implore the governor to work with her to implement peace instead of continued violence on her people. Maybe if he helps her, she won’t sacrifice him. Also if there’s a good pig she won’t need to.
In this early-AD Odd Couple, Eithne, witch of the salmon people who only tell stories by fire pit, learns how to read and write, learns about world history, learns about Roman life and laws. Lucius learns about the Pictish people, those that his mission has been to quash, and decides to write about this woman and her life. They both warm to each other. Over the weeks they study together in this cave, they become friends, and then they start to fall in love, obvs.
A love story between these two stark contrasts – one of straight lines, one of nature and spirits; one of the invaders vs. one of the oppressed natives – could easily have been as trite and schmaltzy (and annoying) as other attempts at heartfelt stories between colonizer and victim usually are. Although I feared that the final scene would be a bit like the U.S.-only ending of the 2005 Pride & Prejudice – which is superior, but too romantic for Brits apparently – this play managed to avoid all potential traps due to its strong writing delivering on a well-formed idea of what it wanted to accomplish. It did so with humor, great performances, and solid direction from Elizabeth Newman. I really enjoyed the set design and staging (I can’t find if Lizzie or someone else is responsible for the design), especially the circle of fire (erma erma) and the gorgeously done mosaic reveal (LOVED). The only thing I didn’t enjoy was that the little fire pit onstage blew all its smoke right in my face for a good hour as it died out, like no matter what the wind brought it right into my face, the face of the person in that audience who tolerates smoke the worst. My eyes are still burning two days later (they are like pumice, it’s not great). But that’s just me I’m weird. (See seating info below.)
Between the otherwise fresh air in Pitlochry and the lack of a stranger sitting right next to me (keep this up forever, maybe?), this returnship was about as nice as I could have hoped. Sure I got so nauseous on the winding Napoli-coastline-style drive that we had to stop so I could [redacted], but still, what a night. I highly recommend this show.
INFORMATION
The outdoor amphitheatre is up a windy hill, and although the main building and parking lot is a construction zone at present, the climb up and the amphi’s setting is beyond gorgeous. I need to talk to whoever is in charge of their gardening because um I need your help. Although the setting is lovely, the walk may be difficult for those who are less ambulatory.
Because the main building’s under construction and the shows are happening in this relatively small outdoor area at the top of a freaking hill, that means the toilets are unavailable. There is a portapotty up on the hill – one, for everyone. Luckily it never got too crowded (do Scottish people not pee??) but I was less than thrilled about having to use a porto three times (three is the bare minimum for me at the theatre, what fun I have). It was clean and whatever but I dreamt longingly of the endless immaculate newly refurbished stalls of Broadway’s Lyric Theatre, oh those were the days. Oh there are two bar setups up there as well. Nothing more UK than two spacious bar setups with like four staff members, but one toilet.
You have to wear masks everywhere except when you are seated, which seems a bit nonsensical since that’s when you are closest to other people and not walking around an incredibly spacious garden setting. That should really be rethought. Groups are sat so there’s a good few feet between them on each row, but it doesn’t stagger from row to row, meaning you have someone right behind and right in front of you. I guess that’s smarter than being surrounded on all diagonals? but because of it I wish they didn’t actively tell people they could take their masks off once seated.
The seating is open plan; an usher will seat you as you arrive. They sat us on the far aisle from where you enter, second row, so don’t sit there if you hate smoke. Although that was probably a unique occurrence from the universe just to fork with me so you’ll be fine.
‘Adventures of the Painted People’ plays at the Pitlochry Festival Theatre (in Perthshire, the most beautiful part of Scotland), until July 4, when I assume the closing performance will be marked with nonstop fireworks from your shitty neighbors. Just kidding, not in Scotland baby!
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London’s “Made In Dagenham” Is Super Lame, When It’s Not Super Offensive
The “fun” starts even before the performance starts. Symbolizing the half-assed attempt at zaniness to come, the show curtain reads “Made In Dagenham” in kooky block letters in varying ‘60s flower power prints – as a random maid scrubs the edge of the stage. (I assume this person and/or action will factor in later. You know what happens when you assume!)
The curtain rises – to reveal the title still spelled out as it was! How is this possible! Oh, because they are giant Lucite block letters actually on the stage and in the house set. Big block letters used as random set pieces. Just like next to the main character’s bed and in her kitchen and pantry and stuff. Letters. In future scenes, random ‘A’ and ‘E’ 5-foot blocks will appear on the stage. I would love if someone explained why. My guess is because they wanted to distract us from thinking about how bad this show is.
“Made in Dagenham”, the new London musical inspired by the film of the same name, tells the true story of how female Ford factory workers in Dagenham fought for equal pay in 1968. That event, incredible and wonderful and inspiring as it is, should be perfect fodder for a musical. Unfortunately, the creative team didn’t deem the importance of this story important enough, and they made this musical adaptation with amateur and offensive music, beyond unnecessary book scenes, poor character development, lack of editing, and all-around crappiness.
You need a compelling reason to turn a story into a musical. That is step 1. It can’t just be because you want songs in your story. This show satisfied step 1. It’s a great idea for a musical! But step 2 is vital: The music and lyrics need to work. The music needs to enhance the storytelling, not replace it, and it definitely cannot drag the story down. Dagenham’s music brought the whole show crashing down.
It starts with Gemma Arterton, who may have been a Bond girl at one point but will now forever be haunted by “Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters”, at home with her oaf of a husband and her two little kids. She’s singing a song repeating that if you want anything done, you should ask a busy woman. And she irons and cleans and cooks and stuff. It sets the stage for the time period well, the height of women as housewives, but it doesn’t do anything for the story. The song is too lame, in lyrics and pacing, to open a show. Luckily, even though Gemma isn’t much of a singer, she has a lovely stage presence (and deserves better).
At breakfast, Gemma, as Rita O’Grady, tells her aspiring doctor of a young daughter to remember that girls are nurses, not doctors. Good start to the day! The book writer obviously meant for this opening remark to allow us to track Rita’s journey from brainwashed subordinate and housewife to brave gender equality pioneer. Great idea. However, we don’t see such a journey at all. The play shows Rita as timid and complacent in this struggle, and then all of a sudden she’s giving a rousing speech to Ford execs. There is absolutely no journey, no growth. Zero to sixty in half an act.
Of course it’s wonderful when Rita does stand up for women’s rights, but it comes out of nowhere. This is the main point of this show, her journey and her struggle, and it is missing. Any semblance of character development is hard to notice. And then all of a sudden Rita herself is leading the strike, going to neighboring towns to get their factory workers to strike with the Dagenham girls (it’s girls in this show, never women, which is important to demonstrate part of the struggle, but I don’t actually think this was deliberate).
The big ‘let’s all go on strike song’ is one of the saddest parts of the show. It’s the end of Act One, and it goes on for a good 10 minutes, but it’s completely lacking in energy, in wit, in anything positive. Rita is on top of moving stairs, singing ‘Everybody out!’ (the name of the song) over and over. People are dancing and holding signs and stuff below her, but it feels like nothing is happening. ‘Everybody Out’ works a few times when the accompanying lyrics are indeed about striking, but mostly it feels like advice for the audience.
I may have groaned the most during Act Two’s obligatory Things Are Getting Hard song. The strike is hurting everyone, and the girls are losing hope. So they sing a song called – I’m not kidding – “Storm Clouds Montage”. Characters say things to each other, different interactions occur, and in between each spotlight, the chorus sings “Storm clouds on the horizon, tension in the town.” Does it get any triter than that? It doesn’t. And this prolonged number is pretty much this line repeated over and over and overrrrrr again as other crap happens but you don’t even realize it because you are too stunned by this awful lyric that you know everyone thought was super sophisticated.
I would direct you to youtube videos of some of these songs, but just take the titles or lyrics I provide and try to sing them, and you will pretty much have the right melody on your first try. That’s apparently how this show was written. During most musical numbers, I was struck by how similar the songs were to those too long, forced-rhyme poems that bridesmaids and sisters always recite at bridal showers. You know the type. “As soon as we saw you and Dave together, we knew you would love each other through all kinds of weather.” That’s what this music is like. A lyric from one of these songs is (as far as I can remember) “I have no doubt, I know what this is all about.” They also rhyme ‘loads’ with ‘sod’ in a repeating motif. I have never groaned so much. Even during the Spice Girls musical, I was more in awe of its awfulness than in pain. Not the case here.
I don’t know how this music got the green light. Aside from the trite, childish lyrics, the music offers no new melodies. It’s all familiar. Worse yet, too many songs end with a crescendo into a key change, the most well-known device for tricking listeners into thinking a song is moving and powerful. They double up on the end-of-song power punch by having one of the girls belt some riffs all the freaking time, another trick. Both of these at the same time just look super desperate.
The book is a big old mess too. It makes me so sad that this wasn’t edited at all. This show is a first draft script, I am telling you. There are wayyy too many storylines occurring: 1) the strike, 2) Rita’s marital problems because her man isn’t okay with her fight, 3) Rita’s son being abused at school, 4) a Ford executive’s wife being bored as a housewife, 5) who ALSO has an abused son in the school, 6) the prime minister and his cabinet trying to stop the strike, 7) a new Secretary appointed to deal with the strike, 8) one of the girls dying of cancer one night after diagnosis. What the hell. First, obviously, the cancer bit was not done well at all; there is too much going on for that to feel anything but cheap. Also, there is absolutely NO reason for the school abuse thread. None at all. It’s such a waste of story telling that I still can’t believe it made the cut. It allows Rita to meet the exec’s wife, who helps their cause so much by lending Rita a dress to wear at her big speech, but they could have met much more simply. I can’t believe how stupid. The same goes for the prime minister. His only real purpose is to get cheap laughs from the audience by walking hunched over and making easy gross jokes. I had hopes that the new Secretary of Fighting the Unions, a woman, would help the factory workers in their fight, but she ends up being on the wrong side because she’s part of the government. Meaning, her plot line was entirely unnecessary. Her opposition doesn’t spur the strikers on even more or anything. It’s just empty.
For a show about fighting sexism, it’s surprisingly sexist. You could tell it was directed by men and that the book, music, and lyrics were also written by men. Somehow, they make a show about fighting for gender equality sexist. It’s quite a feat. In the first factory scene, when we get to meet all the female workers, all they talk about is sex. One woman asks everyone if they are ‘getting any’, and they make jokes and talk about it because all women can ever talk about is men, right? Apparently that’s what these writers think. It IS the only thing worth talking about right girls! Ugh. Worse, when they have their chance of telling the union leaders all the changes they want, their list goes: “equal pay, chocolate that doesn’t make you fat, perfume, the same rights as the male workers, and OH! more chocolate!” I’m not joking. Later, Rita gets a big tearjerker number when her husband leaves her because obviously the husband will leave once the wife starts doing something important that isn’t making him dinner. She cries instead of using some of her newfound strength to convince her husband and everyone else that the fight is important and that he should make his own dinner. It’s offensive that this tearjerker ballad is expected because it’s a female protagonist, NOT because of sexism back then but of sexism now. In other shows, male characters facing important struggles rarely get the tearjerker ballad about how nothing is important without their wives, yet for female characters it is nearly obligatory. I am sick of it.
What pushed me over the edge was the opening Act Two number “This is America”. Because the strike is causing the factory to lose money, the American Ford executives have to come over. They sing a song about how Americans get shit done and how English people, women, shorter men, and anyone who isn’t the main exec is a ‘faggot’. The guy says faggot at least 10 times. It is awful. But worse is the song, written solely for cheap laughs (that sadly they get a lot of) by making fun of Americans. It’s beyond offensive, not to me as an American but as a person who is alive on this earth. It’s one thing to make good-natured fun of Americans, with jokes as stale and tired as vegan jokes but good-natured and harmless mostly. It is quite another thing to include lyrics that actually are harmful, that forgo the promise to be good-natured and instead rely on ignorance. I don’t understand how the producers haven’t changed these lyrics yet. An army tank rolls in, all the chorus girls in camo bikinis holding machine guns. Gay jokes are made, women are reinforced as being for show. And at one point, the exec actually sings, “Our cops have guns and will blow you away.” Now. At this time. When cops are actually killing unarmed civilians with those guns, this piece of shit song in a piece of shit show IS STILL SINGING THIS LINE.
I wanted to like this show. Even though it was not good, I always always want plays to succeed. Even though it wasn’t great, I was still planning to tell people “Eh it’s not great but you’ll probably enjoy yourself.” But how the people behind this show could leave these lyrics in this song, knowing what is going on in America, I don’t understand. The producers never responded to my complaints about this line and others like it, and now I have no qualms calling bullshit. This is not okay. Another unarmed black man was shot by cops yesterday, did you see that? It’s in the news over here even. But don’t let that keep “Made In Dagenham” from laughing about it. And no, the lyrics in this song are not presented as a serious reflection on our society. They are included for laughs. And yes, the audience laughs. Shame on everyone involved until they make changes.
Also, that random maid? She shows up in most scenes in the background, cleaning things or just listening. It makes no sense. Piece. Of. Crap.
You need a compelling reason to turn a story into a musical. That is step 1. It can’t just be because you want songs in your story. This show satisfied step 1. It’s a great idea for a musical! But step 2 is vital: The music and lyrics need to work. The music needs to enhance the storytelling, not replace it, and it definitely cannot drag the story down. Dagenham’s music brought the whole show crashing down.
It starts with Gemma Arterton, who may have been a Bond girl at one point but will now forever be haunted by “Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters”, at home with her oaf of a husband and her two little kids. She’s singing a song repeating that if you want anything done, you should ask a busy woman. And she irons and cleans and cooks and stuff. It sets the stage for the time period well, the height of women as housewives, but it doesn’t do anything for the story. The song is too lame, in lyrics and pacing, to open a show. Luckily, even though Gemma isn’t much of a singer, she has a lovely stage presence (and deserves better).
At breakfast, Gemma, as Rita O’Grady, tells her aspiring doctor of a young daughter to remember that girls are nurses, not doctors. Good start to the day! The book writer obviously meant for this opening remark to allow us to track Rita’s journey from brainwashed subordinate and housewife to brave gender equality pioneer. Great idea. However, we don’t see such a journey at all. The play shows Rita as timid and complacent in this struggle, and then all of a sudden she’s giving a rousing speech to Ford execs. There is absolutely no journey, no growth. Zero to sixty in half an act.
Of course it’s wonderful when Rita does stand up for women’s rights, but it comes out of nowhere. This is the main point of this show, her journey and her struggle, and it is missing. Any semblance of character development is hard to notice. And then all of a sudden Rita herself is leading the strike, going to neighboring towns to get their factory workers to strike with the Dagenham girls (it’s girls in this show, never women, which is important to demonstrate part of the struggle, but I don’t actually think this was deliberate).
The big ‘let’s all go on strike song’ is one of the saddest parts of the show. It’s the end of Act One, and it goes on for a good 10 minutes, but it’s completely lacking in energy, in wit, in anything positive. Rita is on top of moving stairs, singing ‘Everybody out!’ (the name of the song) over and over. People are dancing and holding signs and stuff below her, but it feels like nothing is happening. ‘Everybody Out’ works a few times when the accompanying lyrics are indeed about striking, but mostly it feels like advice for the audience.
I may have groaned the most during Act Two’s obligatory Things Are Getting Hard song. The strike is hurting everyone, and the girls are losing hope. So they sing a song called – I’m not kidding – “Storm Clouds Montage”. Characters say things to each other, different interactions occur, and in between each spotlight, the chorus sings “Storm clouds on the horizon, tension in the town.” Does it get any triter than that? It doesn’t. And this prolonged number is pretty much this line repeated over and over and overrrrrr again as other crap happens but you don’t even realize it because you are too stunned by this awful lyric that you know everyone thought was super sophisticated.
I would direct you to youtube videos of some of these songs, but just take the titles or lyrics I provide and try to sing them, and you will pretty much have the right melody on your first try. That’s apparently how this show was written. During most musical numbers, I was struck by how similar the songs were to those too long, forced-rhyme poems that bridesmaids and sisters always recite at bridal showers. You know the type. “As soon as we saw you and Dave together, we knew you would love each other through all kinds of weather.” That’s what this music is like. A lyric from one of these songs is (as far as I can remember) “I have no doubt, I know what this is all about.” They also rhyme ‘loads’ with ‘sod’ in a repeating motif. I have never groaned so much. Even during the Spice Girls musical, I was more in awe of its awfulness than in pain. Not the case here.
I don’t know how this music got the green light. Aside from the trite, childish lyrics, the music offers no new melodies. It’s all familiar. Worse yet, too many songs end with a crescendo into a key change, the most well-known device for tricking listeners into thinking a song is moving and powerful. They double up on the end-of-song power punch by having one of the girls belt some riffs all the freaking time, another trick. Both of these at the same time just look super desperate.
The book is a big old mess too. It makes me so sad that this wasn’t edited at all. This show is a first draft script, I am telling you. There are wayyy too many storylines occurring: 1) the strike, 2) Rita’s marital problems because her man isn’t okay with her fight, 3) Rita’s son being abused at school, 4) a Ford executive’s wife being bored as a housewife, 5) who ALSO has an abused son in the school, 6) the prime minister and his cabinet trying to stop the strike, 7) a new Secretary appointed to deal with the strike, 8) one of the girls dying of cancer one night after diagnosis. What the hell. First, obviously, the cancer bit was not done well at all; there is too much going on for that to feel anything but cheap. Also, there is absolutely NO reason for the school abuse thread. None at all. It’s such a waste of story telling that I still can’t believe it made the cut. It allows Rita to meet the exec’s wife, who helps their cause so much by lending Rita a dress to wear at her big speech, but they could have met much more simply. I can’t believe how stupid. The same goes for the prime minister. His only real purpose is to get cheap laughs from the audience by walking hunched over and making easy gross jokes. I had hopes that the new Secretary of Fighting the Unions, a woman, would help the factory workers in their fight, but she ends up being on the wrong side because she’s part of the government. Meaning, her plot line was entirely unnecessary. Her opposition doesn’t spur the strikers on even more or anything. It’s just empty.
For a show about fighting sexism, it’s surprisingly sexist. You could tell it was directed by men and that the book, music, and lyrics were also written by men. Somehow, they make a show about fighting for gender equality sexist. It’s quite a feat. In the first factory scene, when we get to meet all the female workers, all they talk about is sex. One woman asks everyone if they are ‘getting any’, and they make jokes and talk about it because all women can ever talk about is men, right? Apparently that’s what these writers think. It IS the only thing worth talking about right girls! Ugh. Worse, when they have their chance of telling the union leaders all the changes they want, their list goes: “equal pay, chocolate that doesn’t make you fat, perfume, the same rights as the male workers, and OH! more chocolate!” I’m not joking. Later, Rita gets a big tearjerker number when her husband leaves her because obviously the husband will leave once the wife starts doing something important that isn’t making him dinner. She cries instead of using some of her newfound strength to convince her husband and everyone else that the fight is important and that he should make his own dinner. It’s offensive that this tearjerker ballad is expected because it’s a female protagonist, NOT because of sexism back then but of sexism now. In other shows, male characters facing important struggles rarely get the tearjerker ballad about how nothing is important without their wives, yet for female characters it is nearly obligatory. I am sick of it.
What pushed me over the edge was the opening Act Two number “This is America”. Because the strike is causing the factory to lose money, the American Ford executives have to come over. They sing a song about how Americans get shit done and how English people, women, shorter men, and anyone who isn’t the main exec is a ‘faggot’. The guy says faggot at least 10 times. It is awful. But worse is the song, written solely for cheap laughs (that sadly they get a lot of) by making fun of Americans. It’s beyond offensive, not to me as an American but as a person who is alive on this earth. It’s one thing to make good-natured fun of Americans, with jokes as stale and tired as vegan jokes but good-natured and harmless mostly. It is quite another thing to include lyrics that actually are harmful, that forgo the promise to be good-natured and instead rely on ignorance. I don’t understand how the producers haven’t changed these lyrics yet. An army tank rolls in, all the chorus girls in camo bikinis holding machine guns. Gay jokes are made, women are reinforced as being for show. And at one point, the exec actually sings, “Our cops have guns and will blow you away.” Now. At this time. When cops are actually killing unarmed civilians with those guns, this piece of shit song in a piece of shit show IS STILL SINGING THIS LINE.
I wanted to like this show. Even though it was not good, I always always want plays to succeed. Even though it wasn’t great, I was still planning to tell people “Eh it’s not great but you’ll probably enjoy yourself.” But how the people behind this show could leave these lyrics in this song, knowing what is going on in America, I don’t understand. The producers never responded to my complaints about this line and others like it, and now I have no qualms calling bullshit. This is not okay. Another unarmed black man was shot by cops yesterday, did you see that? It’s in the news over here even. But don’t let that keep “Made In Dagenham” from laughing about it. And no, the lyrics in this song are not presented as a serious reflection on our society. They are included for laughs. And yes, the audience laughs. Shame on everyone involved until they make changes.
Also, that random maid? She shows up in most scenes in the background, cleaning things or just listening. It makes no sense. Piece. Of. Crap.
All My Sons at the Old Vic: I Don’t Know How Many Sons We’re Talking About But I’m Bored
You tell me Sally Field is coming to London, I’m gonna be there front and center holding up a big sign with GO SALLY! WE LIKE YOU! written in bubble letters. Metaphorically speaking, of course; I’m not a monster. So the chance to see the absolute ledge, what a ledge, perform live is something I’m grateful for. I’m glad I got to see her. What a treat.
You can tell I’m trying to delay talking at all about the play, huh? Okay, well let’s just say it’s fitting that I saw All My Sons at the Old Vic theatre in London in the same week I finished reading Zadie Smith’s book Swing Time, as both were not unpleasant to experience, but ‘not unpleasant’ is literally all I can say about them. There was nothing gripping about either work. While I liked watching both Sally and Bill Pullman (seriously, Bill Pullman! ledge on ledge!), everyone else felt slightly (or heavily) miscast and misdirected. It felt like Arthur Miller’s classic play has aged out of relevance, and rather than feeling like a noteworthy period piece, it instead felt like a dusty relic.
Sally and Bill (I met them; we’re friends) play a married couple of an adult son. Just one son. They had another son but he died in the war (sad). Two sons is still not enough for an ‘all’, you’re correct – the title phrase reveal was one of the only creative turns of phrase in the whole script. Anyway, so the dead son (sorry) had a sweetheart when he went off to war (as they do, as they do). Ever since – three years now – the girl, Ann, has been corresponding with the other (living) (sorry) son, Chris, and THEY now want to get married. This play was written in a time when it was SUPER NORMAL for a girl whose sweetheart died in war to marry the guy’s brother instead, and that is WEIRD. Luckily, the family also thinks it’s weird, but not in a women-aren’t-property-to-be-inherited-when-a-family-member-dies-that’s-super-gross way, more in the they-don’t-actually-believe-their-son-died way.
Turns out, War Son was only reported ‘disappeared’ those three years ago, so even though all signs point to Dead, Sally (let’s just call her Sally) is making herself sick holding onto any thread of hope that her son is alive. Which you can’t really fault her for, it’s so sad. Poor sad Sally! But even WITHOUT the hope that the son is still alive, it’s still super weird to sign off on your other son marrying the fiancee. Oof.
Anyway, the girl, Ann, comes to visit the family so she and Chris can announce the engagement, and we learn about the friction between the two families that exists for reasons other than brother-swapping weirdness. Bill and Ann’s father worked together, and some shady shit went down, but only Ann’s father ended up in jail. Did her father do crimes? Or was Bill guilty but got away with it by throwing Mr. Ann under the bus? The problem with this being the main conflict is that no one cares.
The other main problem with the show is that Chris (Colin Morgan, Merlin) is miscast, and without a strong Chris to really nail all the nuance and emotional beats and relationships, it all falls apart. His choices felt off, like surprisingly off; I’m surprised at the director here. The only confident, successful directorial choice was the very opening moment, with the house moving upstage amid flashing Americana television screens. I’m disappointed that that new, confident display of this classic work wasn’t continued at any other moment.
In fact, the only emotional beat that rang true was an extraordinarily minor moment between Ann’s brother George and a super-minor-character-neighbor-lady when they acknowledged that they would have ended up together had George not gone off to army, mother. It’s like, literally the neighbor lady’s only scene, so great job making your mark, but the fact that nothing else in the entire show felt as authentic is a shame. Of course, London audiences being as insane as they are, they laughed when George declines meeting her kids, even though it’s a heartbreaking moment, but that’s CLA (crazy London audiences) for you.
While I’m sure this play was revelatory in its time, what being about the problems with profiting from war and all the emotional turmoil it causes in its wake, it felt irrelevant today. And some of the twists seemed nonsensical. When Bill Pullman yells at his son (living) in the climax, he all of a sudden asks, “Was the money the problem? You had too much money?” and I literally went, “um, weird flex”, because that was literally the most random reaction to the argument, coming out of nowhere and clearly not the issue. Everything sort of felt untethered like that, disjointed and random. Even the big reveals at the end, both about Bill’s true actions regarding the crime and the other son’s disappearance, feel incredibly unsatisfying. (They also don’t make a ton of sense on examination. If Larry (dead son) knew about the dad’s trial and potential crime, that means it was at least MONTHS since the incident/arrest, and he never once spoke to his family to hear their response or thoughts? He just assumed his father was guilty and then decided to do what he did? do not buy it.)
And yet, despite all this disappointment in the play, I think Sally (and Bill, really) did a nice job. Poor sad Sally was literally shaking the entire time, but you believed that she was a grieving mother with too many traumas to keep in their appropriate boxes, leaving everything threatening to unravel. I just didn’t think this production was strong enough for her talents.
