| Second Viewing of London-bound Production Impresses |
At Dirty Protest |
| Dirty Protest- Last Christmas , Aberystwyth Arts Centre , December 8, 2014 |
Matthew Bulgo’s “Last Christmas” has been seen this year in Edinburgh, Porters, the Torch and Aberystwyth before it makes an appropriately seasonal visit to London this week. That makes Dirty Protest the most-travelled company of the year, up there alongside Theatr Clwyd Cymru and Terry Hands’ resplendent “Under Milk Wood.” A play from a new writing company has been seen at the Soho Theatre before but it was a long time ago. That time it was courtesy of the officially designated company for new writing. In 2014 it is from a company made by theatre writers and actors, driven by entrepreneurial zeal and a conviction that the making of drama matters in a landscape sometime distracted by other concerns and purposes. That zeal and spirit has taken its next step forward with the Playwrights Studio Wales initiative. “Art and Guff” played the Soho Theatre in March 2001. Jeni Williams, the lead commentator on theatre at the time, considered, in New Welsh Review April 2001, that the London press did not really get it. No such under-appreciation of “Last Christmas” is likely. A second viewing of a play is always revealing, and three aspects of “Last Christmas” come to the fore. Matthew Bulgo can write from close-up observation. He has Suse, a corporate climber, who not only works though lunch but ensures that everyone knows it. But crucially he has a powerful sense for form. “Last Christmas” is a monologue but structured on four principal, and vivid, sequences. It is also reminiscent of a point in Richard Eyre’s newly republished artistic credo. “Art must be serious about itself. That doesn’t mean it can’t be funny but it means it can’t be trivial.” There is laughter to be had in Tom’s raucous office party and the picture of Swansea’s drinking holes but it is prelude to things that matters. The moral heart is the encounter, in recall, with a parent who has gone. When Tom says “I’m sorry I haven’t been back more” it is the voice of a million children-become-adults with their own concerns and busy-ness. He rounds off with a line that evokes what a true Christmas might be about. “I say the sorries and the thankyous and I feel so good again.” Siön Pritchard has been living with his character a long time. When he opens with a sequence of relationship manoeuvring the first impression that the acting imparts is that of a jaunty ease. It is an impression achieved, under Kate Wasserberg’s direction, only with fierce discipline and repeated concentration. “Last Christmas” plays Soho Theatre 9-21 December including Sundays. |
Reviewed by: Adam Somerset |
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