strangers, babies. To 17 March.

Edinburgh

strangers, babies.
by Linda McLean.

Traverse Theatre To 17 March 2007
Tue-Sat 8pm Sun 5pm Mast 17 March 2.30pm
Audio-described/BSL Signed 15 March
Runs 1 hr 30mins.

TICKETS: 0131 228 1404.
www.traverse.co.uk
Review: Thelma Good 27 February

Oblique dialogue gets in the way of seeing what’s important till late on.
Linda McLean’s first Traverse play was One Good Beating, a striking play about a father’s treatment of his children. She has since explored the effect in adulthood of violent childhood traumas.

Her new play’s first scene shows Dan putting together a cheap chair whilst his partner May witters on about a bird lying on their new flat’s £5000 balcony. Not knowing May had something horrible and hard to understand in her childhood means the idle, fragmented discussion about a possibly dead bird irritates rather than intrigues. Unlike McLean’s previous Traverse outing Shimmer, the dialogue lacks a lyrical rhythm; however, the actors hold our attention.

In scene two May meets Duncan, her dad who is about to die. We gather during their scene a little more about her past, not much about her present. Scene three, and the five-part set is reduced to two pieces, forming a bed around and on which May and Roy meet for the first and probably only time. At last tension enters the play – both have a desire for violence.

When she meets her brother Denis, the dialogue as in the first scene is often oblique, though, knowing a little more now, it’s easier to know what to attend to. Yet we still know so little it remains hard to feel much for the characters, even May, the only constant character throughout. Only after the final scene where Gary Collins’ Abel is not going to go till he is sure May’s baby is only sleeping in the next room, was I caught by the play.

It risks losing touch with the audience and forgets how little even careful listening may gather. The production’s glossy, mannered feel adds to the distancing effect of the play’s structure – it’s not helpful when the minimally described ghastly childhood act is very hard to hear about. As a stimulus to thinking about the afterlives of children who commit dreadful deeds strangers, babies is a slow, frustrating but effective fuse; TIE for adults (I’d have welcomed a talkback after the show). But as a straight drama it needs more spikes and hooks.

May : Gillian Kearney.
Dan : Liam Brennan.
Duncan : Sean Scanlan.
Roy : Gavin Marshall.
Denis : Iain Robertson.
Abel : Garry Collins.

Director: Philip Howard.
Designer: Lisa Sangster.
Lighting: Kai Fisher.
Composer: Pippa Murphy.
Video: Fifty Nine Productions.

2007-03-11 10:41:59