UNTIL SHE SLEEPS at the White Bear Theatre

★★★

“There are many complicated strands to the play – probably too many – which dampens the suspense.”

Edward and Henrietta Dunbar are all surface. In public – especially down at the golf club – their silky, satin finish hides a variety of cracks like the finest emulsion. But behind the smooth talk and polished speech, and behind closed doors, we see a very different story. Brad Sutherland’s new play, “Until She Sleeps”, centres on this oddly caustic couple as they navigate the minefield of mistrust and cruelty. The misgivings extend out into the audience; we are never sure whether they are playing a cruel game for others’ benefit or for their own perverse amusement. They are bound to attract comparisons to Edward Albee’s Martha and George, particularly when the less colourful pair – Peter and Nicola – are reluctantly sucked into their orbit.

Henrietta, it turns out, is battling motor neurone disease. At first, she is in the early stages and Edward has his suspicions that she might be faking it. We never really get to grips with his qualms which are swiftly brushed aside and subsequently ignored. Similarly, the subtext of euthanasia is explored briefly, touching on the legal and moral complexities, but not followed through until a passing mention later on. Blackmail and fidelity are subjects more successfully handled, which are expressed through Sutherland’s often sharp dialogue rather than exposition, yet just as we are enjoying the more emotive moments, we are led back into pragmatic issues such as tax evasion and probate.

At its heart, though, is paranoia. A sickness more destructive and toxic to the marriage than Henrietta’s progressing disability. Jonathan Hansler manifests the frustrations with an incisive portrayal of a husband who never knows if he is the culprit or the victim. It is a strong performance, levitated with shades of John Cleese on a bad day. Tonya Cornelisse, as Henrietta, vacillates between a provocative closed coolness, and her exposed anger. Her rich, sultry voice dominates the stage, making it all the more tragic when her illness robs her of the power of speech.

Rowland D. Hill and Robin Miller, as Peter and Nicola respectively, are simultaneously the foils and conscience. Less complex, their characters are more weakly written. Miller struggles sometimes with the character of a woman denied the pleasures of an affair, while her lines veer towards simplicity rather than the complexity they require. Hill has more success as he rebuffs Edward’s attempts to lure Peter into his web of subterfuge. These scenes, away from the probing ears of Henrietta (or so we think), enhance the smokescreen effect of deceit and secrecy.

Despite the odd instance of clumsy blocking, David Furlong’s direction keeps the narrative fast paced and succinct (every now and then we fast forward a year or so) yet manages to take a breath for the humour to relieve the darkness. The isolation often found in a relationship is occasionally played for laughs before being plunged back into pathos. There are many complicated strands to the play – probably too many – which dampens the suspense. And sometimes the actors appear to be struggling to keep up. Yet despite the complexities we eventually find ourselves on the straight and narrow. The brief appearance of Nurse Millie (Orsolya Nagy) is an odd and superfluous decision. The intention is maybe that she steers us towards the play’s conclusion, but it is only when Edmund and Henrietta are left alone again that we can actually reach it. Saying very little, Hansler powerfully turns his character around with a quiet, emotionally charged performance that answers more of our questions than the rest of the evening managed to.

UNTIL SHE SLEEPS at the White Bear Theatre

Reviewed on 7th November 2024

by Jonathan Evans

Photography by Paddy Gormley

Previously reviewed at this venue:

SEVEN DAYS IN THE LIFE OF SIMON LABROSSE | ★★★½ | October 2024

THE BOX | ★★★ | July 2024

JUST STOP EXTINCTION REBELLION | ★★★ | February 2024

I FOUND MY HORN | ★★★★ | February 2023

THE MIDNIGHT SNACK | ★★★ | December 2022

THE SILENT WOMAN | ★★★★ | April 2022

US | ★★★★ | February 2022

MARLOWE’S FATE | ★★★ | November 2021

Until She Sleeps

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★★★½

“an engrossing and innovative watch”

This new revival of French-Canadian playwright Carole Fréchette’s 2002 work, Seven Days in the Life of Simon Labrosse is a compelling piece of metatheatre that plays with the boundaries between the real and the fictional, stage and audience.

The principal narrative of the play is, as the title suggests, a retelling of seven days in the life of Simon Labrosse, an unemployed man in an unspecified city. His existence is shaped by sending voice cassettes to his girlfriend Natalie somewhere in Africa, where she is ‘helping the helpless’, confrontations with his landlord and people repossessing his property, and get-rich-quick schemes including working as a sentence finisher and an emotional stuntman.

However, the action begins even before the metaphorical curtain rises on the narrative of the piece. Rob Wyn Jones, playing Simon Labrosse, and Elaine Bastible, as a hired actor also called Natalie, chat on stage about him borrowing her ‘ghetto blaster’ (an unfortunate term that serves as a reminder of the age of the play). Wyn Jones is also forced to leave the stage to go and get actor-director Tony Wadham, playing his depressed neighbour Leo, half dragging him on stage to take his position for the start.

Before telling the story of Labrosse’s life, each of the characters introduces themselves and begins to display their eccentricities. Natalie has an obsession with the workings of the inside of her body, and takes every opportunity she can to address the audience directly on this topic and to attempt to play a mysterious VHS – the content of which is only revealed in the chaotic climax; and Leo, who suffered a tragic accident as a child that left him unable to experience positive emotions, is cast in the role of many surly interlocutors in Labrosse’s life. His main intention in the play is to share his deeply depressing poetry.

The most exciting and innovative moments in the piece come from this trifold relationship between the real-life actors, playing actors within the play, who are in turn playing the characters of the narrative. Watching the actors within the play struggle for control of the piece, as Simon Labrosse tries to keep Leo and Natalie on message is very funny and more interesting than the sketch-like events of the days of the play’s primary story. The actors all give very strong performances: the interplay between them feels natural and is especially commendable given the difficulties involved in playing an actor playing a character.

Wadham’s direction capitalises on the layout of the White Bear Theatre, with the seats lining two sides of the stage, and the physical comedy is outstanding. The set design is evocative of the early twenty-first century and the attention to detail in the costumes is fantastic. This is especially true in the case of Natalie, whose green jumper, blue jeans, knitted shoulder bag and white cowboy boot ensemble fits the oddness of her character perfectly.

Seven Days in the Life of Simon Labrosse is, therefore, a well-acted and intriguing piece that slips between various narrative and structural layers. While it is rather dated in some respects (although 2002 is not 1955), such as the aforementioned ‘ghetto blaster’ and repeated references to Africa as a ‘Dark Continent’, overall, it is an engrossing and innovative watch.

UNTIL SHE SLEEPS at the White Bear Theatre

★★★

“There are many complicated strands to the play – probably too many – which dampens the suspense.”

UNTIL SHE SLEEPS at the White Bear Theatre

Reviewed on 7th November 2024

by Jonathan Evans

Photography by Paddy Gormley

Previously reviewed at this venue:

Until She Sleeps

Until She Sleeps

SEVEN DAYS IN THE LIFE OF SIMON LABROSSE at the White Bear Theatre

★★★½

“an engrossing and innovative watch”

SEVEN DAYS IN THE LIFE OF SIMON LABROSSE at the White Bear Theatre

Reviewed on 24th October 2024

by Rob Tomlinson

Photography by Henrietta Hale

Previously reviewed at this venue:

SEVEN DAYS IN THE LIFE OF SIMON LABROSSE

SEVEN DAYS IN THE LIFE OF SIMON LABROSSE