PORNOGRAPHY To 12 September.

London/Bath.

PORNOGRAPHY
by Simon Stephens.

Tricycle Theatre 269 Kilburn High Road NW6 7JR To 29 August.
Mon-Sat 8pm Mat Sat 4pm & 18, 26 Aug 2pm.
TICKETS: 020 7328 1000.
www.tricycle.co.uk

then Theatre Royal Bath 7-12 Sept 2009.
Mon-Wed 7.30pm Thu-Sat 8pm Mat Wed & Sat 2.30pm
TICKETS: 01225 448844.
www.theatreroyal.org.uk

Runs 1hr 35min No interval.
Review: Timothy Ramsden 6 August.

Finely-controlled picture of the ordinary amid the extraordinary.
Last year was a difficult one for Simon Stephens – for his British audiences anyway. Neither Harper Regan (at the Cottesloe) nor this co-production between Edinburgh’s Traverse Theatre and Birmingham Rep, now sidling into London, make for easy, joined-up viewing. Pornography in particular.

At least Harper Regan had one central character to follow, however disconnected the journey sometimes seemed. This play’s more fragmentary – as the brief unity given London on 6 July 2005, with its announcement as 2012 Olympics host, was shattered the following day by tube and bus bombs.

British plays have often enough been given overtly theatrical ‘European’-style productions. Stephens has designed his script for such a production, its scenes performable in any order. Commissioned for director Sebastian Neubling at Hamburg’s Deutsches Schauspielhaus, its form matches the sudden non-linearity of life following unexpected events, when time, like place, feels blown apart.

Stephens’ bomber travels from Manchester to London (the playwright’s own ports of call), ignored by station staff as he hulks his explosive bag around, a mere nuisance to other underground travellers. He’s arguably the most-balanced character around.

Meanwhile various ‘pornographies’ are revealed – incest, a lecturer turned lecher with a nervy, post-seeking student, a school-student with immaculate uniform and angelically placid features – till his whining insistence (presented simply as it is by Stephens and precisely caught by Billy Seymour) kicks in.

All the characters speak for themselves; Stephens is interested in their lives and doesn’t judge. Accompanying this sense of alienation – everyday life suddenly disrupted, people caught with their flaws down - there’s the sense of strangeness as secret London opens-up in an underground walk, or a woman walks unaware across a silenced capital.

The seemingly familiar revealed as strange, the ground under your feet less firm than it felt before – that’s the achievement of Stephens’ play. Half-recast since last year, the actors integrate beautifully. Monologues and duologues cross each other’s areas as time swings back and forth over the two days; separate lives mingled on a bare, openly-theatrical stage where lights occasionally shine forward into darkness, and interference fizzes around the bomber in Sean Homes’ sharply-pointed, minimally-staged production.

Cast: Frances Ashman, Kirsty Bushell, Sam Graham, Sheila Reid, Billy Seymour, Sarah Solemani, Sam Spruell, Anthony Welsh.

Director: Sean Holmes.
Designer: Paul Wills.
Lighting: Chris Davey.
Sound: Emma Laxton.
Assistant director: William Bowry.

2009-08-07 23:18:24