“There are some great songs in this show and Danusia really can sing”
Danusia Samal’s lovingly crafted show, based on her experiences of busking on the London Underground is engaging, moving, funny and utterly delightful. Anyone who can start a show by singing Otis Redding, and get away with it, is clearly a highly accomplished singer and Danusia more than got away with it, she owned it.
Standing on a set, splendidly designed by Bethany Wells to evoke the Underground, Danusia takes the audience with her on a trip down memory lane that includes characters such as her Mum, her ‘almost Dad,’ Experience, a boyfriend and assorted commuters. ‘Picture this.’ she asks several times, and then draws a portrait through words and song that vividly evoke vignettes from her busking life. The sense of the loneliness of the busker, ignored by passers by, singing her songs to a sea of strangers, is beautifully counterbalanced by the arrival in her life of a character she refers to as Experience. Experience likes to sing, and acts as a sort of alter-ego, pushing Danusia to confront her feelings, to dare to act, and to experience life.
There are some great songs in this show and Danusia really can sing. She is accompanied by two musicians, Joe Archer and Adam Cross and there is great communication between the three of them. Music is the thread that holds the show together, and music can be powerful, often inducing an emotional response better than any other medium. The audience share in Danusia’s feelings as she takes a journey through her memories. Sarah Readman’s lighting Design and Jon McLeod’s sound design work seamlessly with the set to create the underground, the backdrop to her story. The direction has a light touch, leaving the show to feel very natural and immediate, Guy Jones has done a lovely job with this.
I really recommend this show. Catch it while it’s still at Shoreditch Town Hall, you won’t regret it!
“The throbbing backwards and forwards motion of the set pieces, metaphorically becomes the walls of Steven’s mind”
‘Suicide is the single biggest killer of men under 45 in the UK’. So the statistic emblazoned within the programme of new show Distance declares. It is certainly an issue that needs to be extensively addressed, which, collaborators Alex McSweeney and Simon Pittman successfully achieve with their new production. Distance precisely depicts the struggles of one man and his mental health, effectively portraying what so many feel on the inside, but can never be fully understood. McSweeney was compelled to write about this ‘invisible illness’ after five people he knew killed themselves in just over five years. All male. The passion and dedication to get under the skin of this disease is so very apparent. But there is no preaching a cause here. Distance efficaciously negotiates being laugh-out-loud entertaining and heartbreakingly honest within a matter of moments.
Steven (Adam Burton) has been going through a dark time of late. Recently separated, and on the verge of getting a divorce from his wife (Lindsay Fraser), he serendipitously bumps into an old friend (Abdul Salis) whilst on the train to a job interview. On the surface, Steven is friendly and engaged in this rather banal encounter, yet, deep down, he is spiralling into the dark, troubled inner depths of his mind and being. We find him frantically trying to makes sense of the chaotic world around him and his place within it. Action abstractly flits from the present, to being taken on a trip to the inside of Steve’s head, hearing, and physically seeing, the unrestrained, and often, disturbing feelings that he is currently enduring.
Burton delivers a hard-hitting and truthful portrayal of the how it must be like to have a “black dog” inside you, as his character Steven describes it. With nuanced ease he conveys swinging between functioning normally on the outside and then demonstrating quick flickers of the pain and turmoil on the inside – the double-edged sword of depression. The rest of the cast offer tremendous backup in their supporting roles, providing either lighter relief or painful context for Steven’s struggles.
The cherry on top is the ingenious set design from Bethany Wells, which feels like a character in itself. The throbbing backwards and forwards motion of the set pieces, metaphorically becomes the walls of Steven’s mind, gradually enclosing on him at a claustrophobic rate and then easing out again as he tries to feel and act ‘normal’.
Distance offers an excellent examination on mental health issues, raising a red flag on how it can affect not just the person themselves, but the loved ones around them, as well as intimating the pressures our society implements on us all. Particularly, the sense of there being a universal crisis of masculinity. Powerful and thought-provoking yet enjoyably accessible. A winning combination for bringing much needed awareness to a deeply serious matter.
