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Possibly a case of trying to be too arty and forgetting to make it clear what you wanted to say.Summary
Rating
Ok
Two childhood friends (Tom George Fletcher and Ruari Spooner) find themselves on a late-night road trip to collect an engagement ring. It’s the first time they’ve spoken for eight years, their lives having gone in very different directions. But when they find themselves taking a detour and hitting a deer, their journey really starts to unravel. We get to delve into how they drifted apart, resentment of feeling left behind, and fears of growing up; except being young men, they can’t say these things out loud.
Here’s the problem though.
I left the theatre wondering if it was just me that wasn’t quite sure what was really going on, or had the show failed in its basic requirement of allowing an audience to understand? Of course there’s always room for the abstract, something to make us question it all, but even so… well was it me or was it the show?
It’s clear the writer (Fletcher) had a plan, and that they wanted it to have an air of mystery. But it just feels as if they got so caught up in deep thought they forgot to leave us enough morsels to piece it all together. There are simply too many threads that appear and disappear with no obvious reason; the car following them, the mysterious ring owner, the boys in the forest, who is Alfie? – all mentioned as if important, none ever satisfactorily followed through.
Yes, we have the core theme of how young men do not talk about their feelings, instead bottling it up inside to fester into bitterness. But in its present form the show is a bit too messy. Perhaps a case of lots of great ideas without the discipline to know when to leave a few out.
The staging only adds to the problem. Whilst the use of what looks very much like gaming chairs is a clever idea to represent them driving, and does allow the car to be dismantled quickly for scenes outside of it, it creates a big issue of sightlines. Actors sit so low down it’s almost invisible for anyone further back than the first two rows to see anything. Which would be OK for short periods, but this is a road trip and so for vast lengths of conversations I simply couldn’t see either actor. There feels no reason the seats can’t be boosted up higher to make them more visible. Sightlines is something directors should learn very early on in their careers, and if you’re self-directing, maybe get another person in the room to check them for you?
What is good (mostly) is the sound and lights. Lots of thought has clearly gone into both. The lighting gives off late night driving vibes, especially when they find themselves on quiet little roads. Sound has also been carefully considered. We are placed fully in their car with them, clicks of doors and indicators helping remind us where we are, whilst the incidental music aids in creating the required atmosphere. Where the sound does go wrong is in the rather abstract moments where voice-overs occur, but clarity is too often lost in the accompanying noise.
It’s always possible that it’s just me who didn’t make the right connections. There’s no doubting the artistic effort that has gone into Charles, My Dear Fellow, but I can only say that for me it failed – a case of trying to be just a bit too clever and arty, whilst failing in the most basic tasks of delivering an engaging story that takes the audience along with the characters on their strange journey.
Written by: Tom George Fletcher
Directed by: Tom George Fletcher and Ruari Spooner
Composed by: Oliver Spooner
Charles, My Dear Fellow plays at Lion and Unicorn Theatre until 20 July.
