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Dangerous Giant Animals – 3 Stars

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Dangerous Giant Animals

Dangerous Giant Animals

Park Theatre

Reviewed – 28th October 2018

★★★

“Murdock’s writing shines for the majority of the show – it’s beautifully human and relatable”

 

It is always exciting when a play gives voice to a rarely heard story. This is one of them; exploring the difficulties of being a sibling carer. However, Dangerous Giant Animals is also the story of a play that sabotages its exceptional beginning and middle with a bafflingly smug ending.

We see Christina Murdock (who also wrote the play) travel through a series of snapshot journeys as Clare, who grew up having to care for her disabled sister, from ages seven to seventeen. The effects on Clare’s family life and education are tumultuous as she tries to balance providing adequate care for her sister, while also having to overcome her guilt for having to make choices that will benefit her life. Murdock’s performance is masterful, as she paints the world before her eyes with staggering clarity and simplicity, while still conveying the complexities of her situation. This is aided by the smart design of the set (Anna Lewis), sound (Nicola Chang), and lighting (David Doyle) that all layer on generous helpings of atmosphere and meaning without ever feeling intrusive.

Murdock’s writing shines for the majority of the show – it’s beautifully human and relatable, and consistently harnesses the drama in the domesticity of any situation. The middle of the show in particular features a string of breathless sequences featuring Clare on a heart-breaking car journey, and later trying to calm down her sister. However, directly following this, Dangerous Giant Animals undermines all the stellar work it had done thus far.

All momentum is ground to a halt as the play feels the need to directly address the audience, condescending them for assuming the plot was going in a particular direction (although given the script makes no prior allusion that this direction was a possibility, it’s a pretty baseless accusation). The show then congratulates itself on being smart and subversive, which feels totally misguided and is deeply disappointing to watch. In the space of a minute, Dangerous Giant Animals descends from having the audience in the palm of its hand to antagonising them for no logical reason. This was a huge misstep on the part of Murdock as well as co-directors Jessica Lazar and Adriana Moore, that consequently makes the remainder of the show simply feel pretentious and self-indulgent.

Dangerous Giant Animals is mostly a touching and insightful deep-dive into an important issue, that’s capped off by a frustrating end that vilifies its audience. I sincerely hope that alterations are made before the show transfers to the Tristan Bates Theatre that will bring a more consistent level of quality, and do justice to the story being told.

 

Reviewed by Tom Francis

 


Dangerous Giant Animals

Park Theatre

 

SIT-Up Sunday also included:
And Before I Forget I Love you, I Love you | ★★★★ | October 2018

 

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For Reasons That Remain Unclear – 2 Stars

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Reasons

For Reasons That Remain Unclear

King’s Head Theatre

Reviewed – 27th July 2018

★★

“Haines and Peterson both look the part, but together lack chemistry, spontaneity and variety in their performances”

 

Perhaps best known for his ground-breaking 1968 play ‘The Boys in the Band’, distinct for being one of the first Broadway productions to focus on the lives of the gay men, Mart Crowley is an inspiring and important playwright to have as headliner for the King’s Head Theatre’s 2018 Queer Season. Artistic director Adam Spreadbury-Maher has called queer work a “vital part of [the King’s Head] programme” and it’s inspirational to see a well-known fringe theatre championing queer stories.

‘For Reasons that Remain Unclear…’ is an odd and troubling way to kick off the season then. Patrick and Conrad meet seemingly by accident on the streets of Rome and retire to a lavish hotel room together. There, they banter and tease their way through the afternoon, until a major twist upsets the days’ proceedings and alters everything we’ve seen before. Conrad, a staunch yet flamboyant Catholic priest is actually Patrick’s childhood abuser. The hotel door is locked, there’s no escape, and the pair must battle it out for repentance and reconciliation.

As proved recently in the saga that brought Kevin Spacey’s career to a standstill, relating themes of homosexuality with sexual abuse is a contentious idea, and one that this script ultimately fails to address comprehensively. First performed in 1993, Crowley’s text already feels dated, and struggles to stay engaging through to the very end. The characters are simply not interesting enough. It’s also so prescriptive (the sheer volume of stage directions and adverbs is absurd) that it cannot do anything except hamper the actors’ freedoms. Simon Haines and Cory Peterson both look the part, but together lack chemistry, spontaneity and variety in their performances. Daniele Alan-Carter, playing a very minor role as room service attendant, becomes a surprising hit, oozing sexual charm and confidence. Jessica Lazar, who’s astounding work on ‘East’ earlier this year remains a fringe highlight, here struggles to get her director’s voice heard. Like a drunken one-night stand, the climax of the piece is underwhelming, and again, restrained by its own design. Would you really confront your abuser just to then shout at him for fifteen minutes? Haines rattles through large chunks of climactic text as if he too simply wanted the whole thing to be over and done with.

At the end, what really remains unclear is: why is this play being staged now? Boring, monotonous, and drawn out, the King’s Head ought to do better than this story of male abuse if it wants to truly represent queer lives.

 

Reviewed by Joseph Prestwich

Photography by Alex Brenner

 


For Reasons That Remain Unclear

King’s Head Theatre until 25th August

 

 

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