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Superstar

Southwark Playhouse

Reviewed – 28th November 2019

★★★★

“It’s Wren’s warm and engaging delivery that makes this so delightful to observe”

What would you do if your older brother was the lead singer of one of the world’s biggest rock bands? Ride on their name, or strive to carve out your own career, purely on the merit of your own talent? Well, Nicola Wren faced such a dilemma. In an entertaining divulgence into her life, Wren ‘writes what she knows’ into a frank autobiographical one woman show that is tantalising.

Nicola was an accident. A few too many sherries on Christmas Day type of accident, where nine months later she was welcomed unexpectedly into the Martin household. The youngest of four other offspring, she was constantly playing catch up. Each of her siblings had found their ‘thing’ and it wasn’t until Nicola was on stage as Rabbit No.3 in her local village play that she knew she had found her calling. She was going to be an actor. No, a superstar. Everyone said so. Although, there was one thing that kept getting in the way. Her brother was the lead singer of this band called Coldplay and for some reason he kept getting all this attention… Through the ups and downs of crushed dreams and little triumphs, Nicola faces major reality checks and time to question her purpose in life.

Wren may have been driven to the point of changing her surname to stop the questions about Chris Martin, but this isn’t a play just about begrudging a celebrity brother’s fame. Instead, all of Nicola’s siblings feature as she shifts the narrative to the more universal and relatable theme of how it feels being the youngest, always having to prove themselves.

There’s plenty of in-jokes for the fellow struggling performers or theatre luvvies in the audience, which may go over the heads of the uninitiated, but this shouldn’t lessen any of the enjoyment or laughs through this show. Wren is as adept with physical comedy as she is finding the moments of thoughtful reflection and poignancy.

The set (Cara Evans) is reminiscent of what an eight-year old dreaming of fame would want: Flashing lights and tinsel curtains a la Saturday night TV game shows. A single clothes rail gives Nicola relished moments to put on costumes and reminisce over her previous ‘stellar’ acting roles, which sounds more pretentious than it turns out to be. Fortunately. That aside, the stage is fairly barren, giving space for Nicola’s brazen persona to bounce around.

The style of a show within a show has been used countless times by many solo performers, yet Wren does it solidly well, finding a way of making it her own and being completely self-aware about it. Other solo show staples like audience participation slip their way in, but are executed in an unobtrusive and natural manner.

Nicola is an extremely watchable entity. Full of charismatic charm, she wins you over and makes it impossible to dislike. Her life story is not hard-hitting or gritty, her predicaments hardly challenging, but it’s Wren’s warm and engaging delivery that makes this so delightful to observe.

Reviewed by Phoebe Cole

Photography by Karla Gowlett

Superstar

Southwark Playhouse until 21st December

Previously reviewed at this venue:

The Rubenstein Kiss | ★★★★★ | March 2019

Other People’s Money | ★★★ | April 2019

The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button | ★★★★★ | May 2019

Once On This Island | ★★★ | August 2019

Preludes | ★★★★ | September 2019

Islander | ★★★★★ | October 2019

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★★

“A more undiluted approach would undoubtedly give a much sharper taste of the man and his muse”

“Muse” is a new play based on the life of surrealist photographer Dora Marr and her relationship with Pablo Picasso. Given just a sixty-minute slot as part of the Camden Fringe it cannot hope to be much more than a snapshot of this fascinating and turbulent liaison. Their relationship lasted nearly nine years, during which Picasso held onto his other mistresses; in particular Marie-Thérèse Walter, the mother of his daughter Maya. Picasso was a complicated and multi-layered character whose wives and lovers were absolutely integral to his career; they were very much the subjects that inspired him, and while history neither condones nor condemns his sometimes abusive conduct, it relishes exploring the relationship between the artist and his muse.

Antonia Georgieva’s play follows a long line of dramas that focuses on this theme. But rather than focus on its subjects the lens swoops chaotically, trying to catch a wider angle and cram in too many other personalities. Surrealist poet Paul Éluard and his wife Nusch make cameo appearances, Man Ray gets a mention; the writer Lise Deharne and art critic Françoise Gilot are caught off camera. The result is a blurred portrait that, instead of enticing us to unravel the confusion, is not particularly interesting to look at.

By her own admission, Georgieva, who also directs, has opted for an abstract, fragmented telling of the story. The cast, whilst appearing not to know fully what that story is, give committed performances. Sarah Kentish’s Marie-Thérèse Walter stands out with her mix of jealousy towards and superiority over Dora Marr, neatly combining the desire to fight with a weary resignation. But Jahmai Maasai lacks the presence and bullish charisma to portray Picasso. Whether he is trying to reveal the softer side of Pablo is unclear, but you never get a true sense of one of art’s most famous womanisers. He appears weak, especially in the famous episode where, having been confronted by Walter and Marr to choose between them, he tells them to fight it out for themselves.

The peripheral characters are somewhat superfluous, and hugely underwritten. Georgieva gives Claire-Monique Martin’s spirited Nusch Eluard too fleeting an appearance (Nusch is a character who deserves a play to herself) and the others are cruelly relegated to the side-lines.

Pablo Picasso had complicated relationships with many of the women in his life. He either revered them or abused them (famously quoted as saying that “there are only two kinds of women, goddesses or doormats”). He was married twice and had multiple mistresses, often simultaneously, and it can be argued that his sexuality fuelled his art. “Muse” is a generalised account of this fact that gives short shrift to his muses. Blink and you miss a couple of them. A more undiluted approach would undoubtedly give a much sharper taste of the man and his muse.

Reviewed by Jonathan Evans

Photography by Timna Lugstein