Tag Archives: James Dart

The Lying Kind

★★★

Ram Jam Records

The Lying Kind

The Lying Kind

Ram Jam Records

Reviewed – 1st December 2019

★★★

 

“Purposefully lacking in festive cheer, there is still plenty to cheer for”

 

Not seen in London since 2002, Anthony Neilson’s “The Lying Kind” has all the ingredients of a perfectly crafted farce, adding in some seasonal flavours of the Nativity that leaves a delicious, yet undetermined taste in your mouth. But with Neilson’s reputation for shocking his audience don’t expect the usual Christmas fare. Yes, it is set on Christmas Eve, and even throws in a character called Balthasar (although not quite the wise man here) and a couple of Carols. There any similarity ends as we are taken off on a tangent of cross purposes, cross dressing (and undressing); misunderstanding and murder; dead dogs and dead daughters, paedophile vigilantes and closet queen vicars. Dreaming of a White Christmas? This is as black as you’ll get.

The script promises few tidings of joy, but this production bears them in abundance; led by the team that brought Philip Ridley’s “Radiant Vermin” to the same venue last year. Although only their second production, The Kingston Theatre Company – formed by producer/actress Joy Bowers and director Erica Miller – are proving to be a vital asset to fringe theatre on the outskirts of the capital. For “The Lying Kind”, the small music and cabaret venue has been transformed, by designer Amy Snape, into a shabby but homely living room. Into this drab vision of suburbia enter two inept policemen, Blunt and Gobbel. They dither on the doorstep as they pluck up the courage to tell the elderly couple who live there that their daughter has been killed in a road accident. Before they enter the house, a subplot is set in motion as they are assaulted by an overzealous member of the neighbourhood vigilante group: Parents Against Paedophile Scum, who think they are trying to harbour a child molester.

The bulk of the story is made up of the two officers’ sheer inability to divulge the tragic news to the unsuspecting couple within the house. The rules of farce are strictly adhered to and as confusion builds and logic falls apart with surreal abandon, the twists continue to confound the audience’s self-satisfied belief that they are one step ahead of the characters. Joy Bowers, as Gobbel, gets the performance absolutely spot on. Originally written for a male actor she ingeniously switches the gender and is a guiding star throughout the evening with her deadpan comic timing and self-deprecating mockery of her stooge like character. James Dart relishes his role as the put upon Reverend Shandy, mistaken for a paedophile and – quite literally – forced back into the closet. Erica Miller has taken some bold decisions with the text that Dart is all too happy to take on board.

Miller certainly rises to the challenge of staging an ambitious text. The intricate mechanics required by the script, however, do grind to a halt all too often. The piece relies on all the cogs working in unison. Julia Lacey and Cynon Lewis, who play the bereaved couple Garson and Balthasar respectively, lack the skills required to deliver Neilson’s text. The dialogue is a gift, but they barely take off the wrapper. Even in farce more layers need to be pulled back to reveal the reality of the characters and to make us care for them.

Fortunately, though, the laughs keep us going throughout the evening. Laughs that do paper over the sometimes inconsistent acting. But what they don’t cover up is the underlying adage that it is always better to tell the truth. If you want a quiet life that is: Neilson doesn’t want to get too schmaltzy with his message. So, if you want to avoid the usual Christmas message this year, “The Lying Kind” is well worth travelling afar to catch. Purposefully lacking in festive cheer, there is still plenty to cheer for.

 

Reviewed by Jonathan Evans

Photography by Catherine Harvey

 

The Lying Kind

Ram Jam Records until 9th December

 

Previously reviewed at this venue:
Radiant Vermin | ★★★★ | September 2018
Three Shades | ★★★★ | March 2019

 

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Radiant Vermin – 4 Stars

Vermin

Radiant Vermin

Ram Jam Records

Reviewed – 13th September 2018

★★★★

“a fable for modern times but with an age-old message: be careful what you wish for”

 

We’re in the back room of a pub, candles flickering on cabaret tables under the dim lights. A bare stage, empty of set and props, gives no hint as to what is to come. We barely notice, at first, the two characters around which Philip Ridley’s “Radiant Vermin” centre, as they wander into the space. Were it not for the fact they are carrying their one-year old son we’d think they were just looking for their seat. Instead they head straight for the stage and introduce themselves. They are Ollie and Jill and they want to tell us about their dream home. All affability and charm they feel the urge to share with us some of the horrible things they did to get it. Through wholesome smiles they warn us we might find their story shocking, but they are “good people”. They did it all for their baby.

James Dart and Joy Bowers, as the couple, immediately draw us into Ridley’s outrageous and provocative drama. Playful but vicious, this very black comedy is a meditation on how far we will go to satisfy our materialistic greed. We’re not invited to judge them; in fact, we are almost made complicit. Their story begins with the arrival of the Mephistophelian Miss Dee, supposedly from a government-led housing department, who offers them a brand-new house. Jennifer Oliver brilliantly feeds just the right amount of supernatural menace into her eagerness to get the couple to agree to an offer that is literally ‘too good to be true’. Though there is a catch. The house is a bare shell and the renovation is down to the new occupants.

When Ollie accidentally kills a homeless intruder one night, the kitchen is miraculously transformed into the one of their dreams, which triggers the realisation that for each vagrant murdered, another room of the house is renovated. The speed with which this well-founded couple persuade themselves that new furnishings are worth a human life is staggering. The play could easily be construed as a rather blunt indictment of greed, another of Ridley’s rants against a godless society; but we are on subtler ground here and the sheer absurdity of the premise gives it a sharp comic edge.

Yet what is even sharper are the performances. The virtuosity with which James Dart and Joy Bowers deliver the quick-witted dialogue is what makes this piece thrillingly entertaining. Dart perfectly captures the disturbing malleability of the human spirit as he shapes his morals to justify his deeds and satisfy the needs of Jill – the Lady Macbeth figure brilliantly portrayed by Bowers. They are both gambling with the devil, and the two actors chillingly, yet hilariously, fall into the trap of not knowing when to quit.

Erica Miller’s fast paced direction keeps us, and the actors, on their toes throughout. This is a fable for modern times but with an age-old message: be careful what you wish for. But the many layers go way beyond that even. Like shattered glass it reflects many angles of today’s consumerist society in which, for some, having everything you could ever wish for is not enough anymore. Are we living in a world where decent people, through a desperate materialism, are able to drown their conscience in such drunken logic?

But Ridley’s polemics aside, this is a compelling production in a little gem of a venue which, although slightly off the beaten track, is well worth covering that extra ground to get to.

 

Reviewed by Jonathan Evans

Photography by Erica Miller

Ram Jam Records

Radiant Vermin

Ram Jam Records until 17th September

 

 

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