CURATING
Old Red Lion Theatre
★★
“comes over as a 15-minute sketch which has been extended beyond its capacity to entertain”
The afterlife offers rich territory for writers and actors. We know nothing solid about it, after all. In this new play by Helen Cunningham (who also takes the lead as Freya), it is treated as an opportunity for comic character development and a chance to poke fun at red tape.
The play opens with a young woman (Andrea Matthea) awkwardly dressed in Edwardian costume and puffing on a vape as she sits near a work station piled with paperwork. A young man (Gwithian Evans) bursts in, flurried and in a state of chaos. A bit of comic stage business follows that involves vaping, a computer that he can’t get to work, and a bottle of whisky.
It soon transpires that this is a waiting room for the afterlife where souls are being processed and prepared for their life in eternity. The job of the two on stage is to ‘curate’ these souls individually. With a long list to work through, they exit in a hurry; the stage goes dark and when the lights come on again Freya is found lying on the floor as if she has been carelessly tossed into the room. Evans’ curator enters and the fun begins.
Freya has no idea she is dead, cannot remember the circumstances that led to her to this place and, anyway, is suffering from a splitting headache. An interview peppered with misunderstandings ensues but the curator trips over another piece of mishandled admin and exits to sort it out, leaving the fourth player, John (Trey Fletcher), to blunder in by accident. The twist – that he is from 1898 – gives further opportunities for a comic dialogue of misunderstandings – and leads to a troublesome confession.
Unfortunately, there are too many ideas and much of the comic potential is never fully realised. I wondered if this was a first outing as a director by Nikoletta Soumeledis (who appeared at the Old Red Lion earlier this year in ‘Spent’). She is an experienced actor and writer but fails to get a grip on this play. It comes over as a 15-minute sketch which has been extended beyond its capacity to entertain. There are too many long pauses, the anachronisms are not properly dealt with (would a man from 1898 use the expression ‘upbeat’?) and the ending peters out making no sense. The actors all need tighter direction with the exception of Evans who delivers a well-tuned haphazard performance in keeping with his character. He is the most engaging presence on stage and an actor to watch for the future.
CURATING
Old Red Lion Theatre
Reviewed on 1st November 2025
by Louise Sibley
Photography by Miranda Mazzarella
Previously reviewed at this venue:
DEATH BELLES | ★★★½ | October 2025
FRAT | ★★ | May 2025
EDGING | ★★★ | September 2023
THIS IS NORMAL | ★★★★ | September 2023
REPORT TO AN ACADEMY | ★ | July 2022
TOMORROW MAY BE MY LAST | ★★★★★ | May 2022
