Paines Plough was founded in 1974 over a pint of Paines bitter and is now the national theatre of new plays, so on both counts its involvement with the Traverse Theatre, Scotland’s theatre of new writing, and with Òran Mór’s A Play, A Pie and A Pint, is highly appropriate. This is the third play in the new 5-week Autumn season of A Play, A Pie and A Pint, the now 7 year old institution that showcases world premiere plays that touring the first 3 plays to four cities – Glasgow, Edinburgh, Coventry and, for the first time, Manchester.
This play starts off with a major bitching session in a café from the very needy Nina (Denise Hoey) who is just back from an adventure in Borneo from which she still carries lots of emotional baggage. She has sought out her old friend Lorna (Clare Waugh), who is settled and married with a baby, and unloads her unresolved issues on to her. It is only clear as the play nears its end what tragedy is behind Nina’s vitriol.
While the two women played their parts well, there was little to sympathise with in the destructive dynamics between them. It was not clear what ever had connected them and why one or the other wanted to perpetuate the tangled mismatch of their relationship that lacked the nourishment that might have created some empathy. There was a deep lack of connection that translated to disturbing parallel conversations that were at times cruel and highly insensitive.
This play was longer than most in the lunchtime series and could have edited. Without taking away from Ben Winger’s performance as the Barista, the presence of a scruffy bobble hatted waiter added little to proceedings.
The scene at the end when Nina returns to Borneo was heavy handed and clumsy and tipping into the ridiculous. Orang-utan suits just don’t lend themselves to poignancy. What should have been a moving play with messages about motherhood, friendship, loss and loneliness turned out to be, for this reviewer at least, a disappointing one. It was a long road for a short cut.
The remaining plays in this season will be God Bless Liz Lochhead (Tues 1 – Sat 5 Nov), Watching the Detective (Tues 8 – Sat 12 Nov), all at 1pm.
All Tickets are £12 and include a play, a pie and a drink from the Traverse Theatre bar café.
Show times
Tues 25 - Sat 29 October 2011 (1pm)