RAW bac to 28 March/Tour to 18 May.

London/Tour

RAW
by Chris O'Connell

Theatre Absolute at bac To 28 March 2002
Tues-Sat 8.30 Sun 6.30
Runs 1hr 15min No interval

TICKETS 020 7223 2223
Review Timothy Ramsden 10 March

Tough stuff that goes soft when it tries to get tender.It's certainly Raw when it starts, with loud aggro-pop, characters racing on, a violent mugging followed by compulsive metal-bashing, light switching and blind pulling. This grafitti-spraying, largely girl, gang don't mind whether they're decorating a wall or someone's face. And it's soon clear it's Lex who leads, and goes far beyond, the others.

In a cast who play mid-teen dysfunction to the convincing hilt, Jo Joyner's Lex seems powered by an inner fury which builds with her muttered mantra, psyching herself into violence. What's less clear is the control she spreads over the others, crime hangers-on in whom uncontrolled compulsion and deprivation-fuelled anger destructively clash. There's too little energy in the chemistry between Lex and the gang.

Samantha Power hits ace-high with her cluttered inarticulacy. Behind it she's clearly reaching for a solution outside the gang, so she invites her friend Rueben to their urban-desolate hideaway. And Clare Corbett, though handicapped by heavy layers of an 'I'm from Bristol' accent, vividly shows a mind locked in desperation, needing to find words – literally – to overcome rejection from her family.

O'Connell provides fewer pointers to the sole gang lad, though Graeme Hawley shows how physical toughness goes with mental vulnerability, standing around like a spare part or finding comfort in compulsively clicking a light switch on and off.

Raw is a companion piece (a third's to follow) to O'Connell's Car. That began in joyrider overdrive before hitting low gear when law and order entered the race. Here too, it's with his outsider that O'Connell has most difficulty. Fascinated by Lex, insisting on coming on one of their joy-raids on the streets, when she's hurt Rueben persuades her sister Shelley to bring the young gang leader to his flat. Even as a part-time Youth Centre art worker he should know that's mad and – as it turns out – near-enough suicidal.

It's here the story becomes an unlikely one of daft decisions rather than the dispute of savagery and sense which might have rounded-out the visceral success of the early scenes and developed the vivid mind and experience problems they so vividly portrayed.

Trainers: Samantha Power
Lorna: Clare Corbett
Lex: Jo Joyner
Addy: Graeme Hawley
Rueben: Gary Cargill
Shelley: Rebecca Manley

Director: Mark Babych
Designer: Dominie Hooper
Lighting: Paul Bull
Sound: Andy Garbi

Tour to:
April
12th Bonnington Theatre, Nottingham
16th Old Museum Arts Centre, Belfast
17th Old Museum Arts Centre, Belfast
18th Old Museum Arts Centre, Belfast
23rd The Junction, Cambridge
24th Felsted School, Essex
26th Pegasus, Oxford
27th Pegasus, Oxford
30th Coventry University, Coventry

May
1st Arts Centre, Darlington
3rd Brewery Arts Centre, Kendal
8th 21 South Street, Reading
9th mac, Birmingham
10th Warwick Arts Centre, Coventry
11th Warwick Arts Centre, Coventry
15th Wycombe Swan, High Wycombe
16th Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester
17th Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester
18th Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester

2002-03-13 10:36:35