Tag Archives: Sepy Baghaei

Mycorrhiza
★★★

The Space

Mycorrhiza

Mycorrhiza

The Space

Reviewed – 15th May 2019

★★★

 

“this would benefit from being condensed into the powerful drama that is aching to come out”

 

Hidden under our feet is an information superhighway that speeds up interactions between a large, diverse population, allowing individuals who may be widely separated to communicate and help each other out. This isn’t the internet. We’re talking about fungi: a mass of thin threads that link the roots of plants. The tree in your garden is probably hooked up to a bush down the road. This ‘wood wide web’ even has its own version of cybercrime, but for the most part ‘Mycorrhiza’ is a process of give and take. Our plants are interacting with each other, just trying to help each other survive.

Writer Luke Stapleton has adopted this for the title of his debut play running at The Space as part of the ‘Foreword Festival’ of new writing; and although the botanical reference runs through the bedrock of the text, it focuses on the two characters and their own complex relationship with each other and their back stories. The story opens to the soundtrack of the Scots rock band, Biffy Clyro, appropriately singing the words: ‘happpiness is an illusion’, while Dean (Scott Afton) and Alicia (Corrina Buchan) are schoolkids stranded on a remote Scottish island as the tide comes in, with no option but to wait until dawn. Flash forward six years to the same beach where they reunite and try to make sense of the intervening years, and of each other.

These two characters are naturally portrayed, with fine performances, by the two actors. On the surface they are the antithesis of each other yet are two sides of the same coin. Afton subtly depicts the tongue-tied anger that lies beneath Dean’s introversion while Buchan skilfully lets us know that beneath her thick-skinned, nervy brashness is a soul that is truly hurting. Buchan’s performance is the more polished and believable, but it is essentially Dean’s story and his struggle with his own masculinity; the cause of which is revealed in a final heartfelt monologue. It is only because he believes Alicia is sleeping and cannot hear that Dean is finally able to give voice to what he has been through.

But the struggles to communicate are also reflected in Stapleton’s struggle to get to the point. There is some fine writing on display with its stinging observations and sharp dialogue that reminds us sometimes of Irvine Welsh. But there is a lot of moss that needs to be stripped away to let us get right to the roots. At ninety minutes it feels long and rather than try to build on this to create a full-length show, this would benefit from being condensed into the powerful drama that is aching to come out. We are not helped by Sepy Baghaei’s staging that sometimes weakens the action and, with a backwash of clumsy transitions, drags it back.

Ultimately, though, a lot of food for thought is washed up and we can pick and choose what we take away with us. It may not be brand new, but it is slightly twisted which makes us look at the issues in a different way.

 

Reviewed by Jonathan Evans

 


Mycorrhiza

The Space until 18th May

 

Previously reviewed at this venue:
Laundry | ★★★ | January 2019
The Dip | ★★★★ | February 2019
The South Afreakins | ★★★★★ | February 2019
FFS! Feminist Fable Series | ★★★★ | March 2019
The Conductor | ★★★★ | March 2019
We Know Now Snowmen Exist | ★★★ | March 2019
Post Mortem | ★★★★ | April 2019
The Wasp | ★★★★ | April 2019
Delicacy | ★★★½ | May 2019
Me & My Doll | ★★ | May 2019

 

Click here to see more of our latest reviews on thespyinthestalls.com

 

Little Women
★★★½

The Space

Little Women

Little Women

The Space

Reviewed – 6th December 2018

★★★½

 

“the performances are committed and energised”


‘Little Women’ is a much loved classic, and Rachael Claye’s adaptation is deeply true to the spirit of its inspiration. Warm and human and familiar, this is a play about family, about growing up, about leaving and about coming back together. Four young women live with their mother, each yearning for different things. Amy is an artist, Jo a writer, Beth a carpenter and Meg wants to make a difference in people’s lives. We meet them as they begin to encounter the world, caught between child and adult.

The cast is consistently strong. Miranda Horn as Beth is particularly lovely, natural and bright onstage. Sean Stevenson’s Laurie is playful and likeable, Amy Gough as Jo is earnest and fervent. In fact across the cast, the performances are committed and energised, and the familial relationships feel nothing but genuine. Jonathan Hawkins as the quirky Professor is a vibrant late addition to the play.

The script captures well what is so brilliant about the book, the relationships and characters are well sketched. However whilst very strong in many ways, it suffers from indecision. The narrative is supposedly set in modern day Crouch End but the dialogue fluctuates back and forth, sometimes genuinely contemporary, in other moments far more mannered and of its time. The ages of some of the characters also seems confused. Stephanie Dickson as Amy, for example, has been directed to play quite young complete with pigtails and a bow in her hair but is simultaneously applying to art school, an incongruence which is not believable.

The show is also a little too long. There are a couple of scenes that are unnecessary, if lovely, and the end, equally is not needed. The image of Beth and Jo together for the last time, of ‘Little Women’ forming in Jo’s mind, is one of both sadness and hope, and I don’t think we learn anything further from the action that follows that. 

A Christmas classic, Claye’s 2018 adaptation of ‘Little Women’ is a charming joy to watch that just needs some tweaking to really situate itself.

 

Reviewed by Amelia Brown

Photography by Matthew Thomas

 

Little Women

The Space until 15th December

 

Last ten shows reviewed at this venue:
Be Born | | June 2018
Asking For A Raise | ★★ | July 2018
Bluebird | ★★★★ | July 2018
I Occur Here | ★★★★★ | August 2018
Rush | ★★★½ | August 2018
Fleeced | | September 2018
Little Pieces of Gold | ★★★★★ | October 2018
Love is a Work In Progress | ★★★★ | October 2018
The Full Bronte | ★★★ | October 2018
Woman of the Year | ★★★ | October 2018

 

Click here to see more of our latest reviews on thespyinthestalls.com