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While overambitious, this considered reflection on what it means to be an activist is a thought-provoking watch.Summary
Rating
Good
Sam (Dan de la Motte) wants to make a difference. He volunteers at an LGBT helpline, he’s vocal about his identity, while his full-time job is writing articles for Z-list pop star Riley Sibanda’s Substack “through a queer lens”—although he’s not 100% sure what that means.
He worries that his life has little real meaning, but he also questions why what happens to him isn’t important. It’s his life, after all; doesn’t that have value? And if people want to read about his experiences, doesn’t that legitimise them? It seems, at first, that he’s on the road to self-love and confidence, a recognition that he matters. But this is not the feelgood route Too Much Pills and Liquor takes. As Sam becomes more enamoured with his celebrity-adjacent life, things take a turn for the worse.
De la Motte is a powerful lead, keeping the energy up for the entirety of the play’s 90-or-so non-stop minutes. He switches with ease between each character he portrays, all while maintaining a rapport with the audience.
The set is minimal but effective. Sam goes from domestic comforts (armchair and lamp) to Tube carriage (a metal bar) to VIP club box (the sound desk) and back again in the small space, and the location is never hard to imagine around the scant props. The skill here is marred, however, by inconsistent and often incoherent lighting. While at first it makes sense – a soft spotlight and a warm table lamp for a conversation at the flat, a harsh red wash for a few lines in the bathroom – it devolves fairly quickly into what seems like an overexcited discovery of the lighting desk’s presets. There’s flashing, blackouts, and a general sense of detachment from what’s happening on stage.
It’s not enough to have the right opinions; you have to act on them. This is the message we’re left with at the play’s close, and it’s something that Sam never quite grasps. The play is about self-awareness, to a large degree, and is in itself self-aware – maybe most clearly in Sam’s lack of this trait. Although there are plenty of jokes and pithy comments, David Levesley’s script is well-written and has a real heft behind it.
That being said, for a one-hander production, Too Much Pills and Liquor drags. It’s not that there’s not enough to be said, rather that the piece is overstuffed with ideas that it doesn’t have the time to fully interrogate. By the end, then, it feels as though you’re only at the start of the conversation. Important, complex questions are asked – what does it mean to be an activist? Is having fun political? How do you change the minds of people fed on misinformation, fear and hatred? – but there’s simply not the space to explore them to a satisfying degree within the scope of the play.
Too Much Pills and Liquor needs work, but the groundwork has been laid down for a piece providing a thoughtful and thought-provoking reflection on the tumultuous, dangerous times we live in.
Writer: David Levesley
Director: Charles Quittner
With songs by: Eden Tredwell
Too Much Pills and Liquor plays at The Divine until Tuesday 2nd JULY.
Further details and booking information can be found here.
