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The Dead Eye Boy
by Lizzie Loveridge
|
He's testing everybody. He's acting out . . . I think about the anger I felt at his age.
--- Billy |
Sid Mitchell as Soren & Nicola Walker as Shirley-Diane
(Photo: Tristram Kenton) |
Soren, (Sid Mitchell) the boy, who was conceived was when his 14 year old mother Shirley-Diane (Nicola Walker) was raped, was born damaged, presumably by an incompetent forceps delivery and blinded in one eye. Through inadequate mothering from his single parent who, little more than a child herself, has no idea of how to raise a child, Soren's damage is also psychological. MacLachlan portrays the mother's volatility, extremes of rage, her own childish behaviour and the near sexual but certain physical abuse of her son. Despite the relative stability Shirley finds in her relationship with recovering drug addict Billy (Brendan Coyle), and his understanding of the boy, the die is cast with Soren's upbringing by a mother crazed on crack. The relentless circle is completed when Soren leaves crack in the house for his "clean"mother to find and ultimately use. The less convincing sub plot is that Billy has recurring nightmares about the death of a child, a small toddler in a burnt out car and that he was the cause of the accident and that this has some prophetic relevance to his life with Soren and Shirley.
Matthew Wright's claustrophobic set is a small house in a poor area with few possessions, outside edges of the yard covered in shredded black rubber, giving the impression of tarmac. This is a violent household with no privacy, no individual space and outside is darkness. The director has not shied away from the fist fights and there are times when all three members of the cast are in a bundle like a wrestling match, a strange merger of sexual play and wrestling. Walker has the bruises to prove this. Pale eyed Nicola Walker is exceptional as the likeable yet desperately short fused mother, trying for some kind of family life, but thwarted by her son. Brendan Coyle, a fine performance too, brings a solidity to the part of Billy, a man who has spent time in prison because of the need to fund his addiction but who seems genuine in his desire to reform. I particularly liked the scene when he rehearses his sales patter to sell vacuum cleaners but gives up. Sid Mitchell has a difficult task in playing the psychotic teenager Soren, both at fifteen and at ten years old when they visit the psychiatrist. It is a tall task for a young actor to get both the accent and the complexity of the role. I think the audience at Hampstead found this play difficult judging from the squirming and shifting in the seats and it is the first time I recall this theatre not being full. However, MacLachlan has a gift for authentic dialogue and according to the programme has just completed his thirteenth play. I hope in these new plays he has found a story line to match his writing.
| The Dead Eye Boy
Written by Angus MacLachlan Directed by Jennie Darnell With: Nicola Walker, Brendan Coyle and Sid Mitchell Design: Matthew Wright Sound: Gregory Clarke Lighting Design: Jason Taylor Running time: Two hours twenty minutes with one interval Box Office: 020 7722 9301 Booking to 9th February 2002 Reviewed by Lizzie Loveridge based on 24th January performance at Hampstead Theatre, Swiss Cottage, London NW3 |
6, 500 Comparative Phrases including 800 Shakespearean Metaphors by CurtainUp's editor.
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