Jelly vodkas and a passed out Spiderman aren’t usually signs of the beginning of a lasting relationship…
James and Heather meet under embarrassing circumstances, and their relationship is awkward at times; filled with rambling conversations about magpies at others, and nicely representative of people finding someone to struggle through life with.
The play is called Communicate, but it is James’ inability to do so that frames the piece. A fault he clearly gets from his Father, Harry, as for most of the production Gareth Watkins is unable to give eye contact, let alone have a proper conversation with another character. This may well be the way the part is written, but at times it’s really jarring to watch. Toby Vaughan, as superhero mask collecting James, is magnetic on stage; his gestures, his asides, everything is so well thought out. So in the long pen cleaning scenes* with his Dad, Vaughan appears to be doing all the work and coming up against a brick wall. The blurb on the programme says the show is inspired by true events, but Harry doesn’t feel real at all.
The staging is simple and fits the sweet story perfectly. It’s just ordinary people dealing with life, and sometimes a piece that stripped back can be really uplifting to watch. The script definitely needs to be tightened up, but Vaughan and Olivia Elsden’s (Heather) performances are lovely to watch.
*It cannot take a whole scene to clean one pen, like seriously 3 minutes of rubbing the same pen is just too long.
⭐ ⭐ ⭐
Reviewed 24/8/16
C nova
Victoria Street
On until 29th August, 1.15pm
simplystageytix 