There were many things I missed during the lockdowns and restrictions of the pandemic. Live performances at the theatre being amongst them. London’s West End and deadly-ish viruses aren’t a great combo. Packing a largely elderly audience, cheek by jowl, into ancient and poorly ventilated buildings was asking for trouble. So they closed, for lengthy periods. Even when they reopened, they were often quick to close again. It just took a couple of cases of Covid amongst the cast and that was that.
Perhaps this is why a new type of show seems to be taking off. A cast of one, just over an hour in length. The fewer people involved, the less likely they’ll have a problem. Or did this genre always exist and I just failed to notice? I don’t know. What I do know is that I went to see a one hour Ralph Fiennes show at Christmas, and this week Mrs P and I went to see Ruth Wilson perform in the Human Voice.
We like Ruth Wilson. She played her grandmother in a BBC production a couple of years ago. It was aptly called, Mrs Wilson, and was a fabulous series. Worth your time watching, if you haven’t already. But we were at the Harold Pinter theatre to watch her in the Human Voice. A play about a woman who is struggling to get through the break up of a relationship. She’s on the phone to the chap concerned. Sitting on the floor of her flat, several stories up.
The audience only hear her half of the conversation. But this type of monologue can work. Some years ago Mrs P and I were sitting one evening waiting for a bus, and were treated to quite the performance by a young chap in his mid teens as he engaged in a phone call with a young lady.
It was clear to us that he had been well and truly dumped in favour of another greasy haired teenage boy. Oh right, well you might as well not worry about me and just go round his house then! It was equally clear that he hadn’t grasped just how dumped he was. Oh, you’re already round his house are ya?! Clear that he didn’t want to accept this. Well why don’t you just shag him then!
And quite clear that he was going to find this an emotional struggle. A pause. A long pause. A quieter voice. Oh, you have just finished shagging him. You might do it again in a minute… The phone was flung violently to the ground. Mrs P and I placed our bets. We both knew that he’d eventually pick up the phone. My money was on it not working. I won.
We took our seats in the theatre hoping for something equally entertaining and dramatic. But truth be told, the script failed to get the story across. It became obvious that Ruth was playing a very vulnerable woman with significant mental health issues. But the script failed to develop an emotive relationship with the punters in the pews. Mrs P rested her head on my shoulder and her eyes began to close. I remained alert. But my attention began to wander.
Our seats were truly in the gods. High enough to induce a spot of vertigo in both of us. I don’t much like heights. I did wonder to myself, if a person does fall from such a height, do they continue to be afraid of heights, or do they start to be afraid of grounds? I mean, that’s what does the damage. The ground. And as Ruth’s character started describing darker scenarios, I started to wonder if a person falling through the trap door of the gallows is instinctively afraid of hitting the floor and forgets about the noose round his neck.
I looked at my watch. Fifty five minutes gone. Twenty to go. I looked at my watch because I noticed quite a few digital watch faces lighting up as their owners turned the devices towards their faces. Twenty minutes later I checked again, only to be disappointed that only an hour had now passed, fifteen to go.
The ending came suddenly. It was quite a well worked ending. A welcome splash of colour at the death. It made the wait worthwhile. Yet I understand why the papers had been dishing out two star reviews. It wasn’t the best production I’ve ever seen. I don’t think ‘dull’ is an unfair description. And yet. Ruth wasn’t to blame, it was nice to see her perform.
The lacklustre response from the ticket buying public means that you can snap up some pretty cheap seats. It’s only a little over an hour long. And it’s awfully nice to be in the theatre…
The Mexile 