Review: Jack Goes to Therapy: A (Somewhat) Romantic Comedy, Bread and Roses Theatre
A very gentle comedy about the joys of therapy, this is unfortunately a little too simplistic.Summary
Rating
Good
The first thing that Canadian teacher Jack (Zac Williams) is worried about is a lump in an embarrassing area, and his attendance at a medical appointment is used to present a huge amount of exposition. This includes that he’s slept with up to ten men in the last three months and is concerned that he might have picked up an STD, but Jack also casually mentions to a nurse that he’s still heartbroken after his former boyfriend Carter left him for another man.
The nurse is able to assure him that the aforementioned lump is a small cyst that he has no reason to worry about, and as we never hear the test results we’re to presume Jack got the all clear on that front. But the one thing she can’t help him with is his feelings for his ex, though she casually mentions that he might benefit from therapy and he’s immediately taken with the idea. There are some cute, funny lines in this opening stretch, which is all but a long monologue bar some recorded dialogue from the nurse, and it sets the scene nicely, even if the idea of “Show, don’t tell” is thrown out of the window here.
What follows is thankfully a lot more naturalistic, as we hear about times Jack spends with friends, a guy he’s regularly hooking up with, as well as why it’s always a bad idea to turn up hungover when you’re a Kindergarten teacher. Yet, while amiable enough, there are definitely moments in this one man show which feel like filler, from an only slightly amusing farce involving his roommate Derek’s inability to realise that Jack is gay, to a few incidents that take place at the school he works in. These sequences are especially weak as Williams impersonates the children and all of them sound like South Park caricatures, and so the interactions with their teacher just seem silly when they’re meant to be charming.
Eventually Jack begins therapy, and the play becomes far more insubstantial. While some research has clearly been carried out, these therapy sessions are curiously short and the small smattering of interesting ideas explored here are dealt with in a simplistic manner. Worse still is that after just two appointments with his miracle working therapist, Jack is cured of his heartbreak, and what’s more, now that he’s comfortable talking about his feelings everyone opens up to him with the difficulties they’ve experienced. Some of these are quite traumatic, so it feels bizarre that suddenly nearly everyone Jack knows are now unleashing their innermost secrets, and it’s a very naïve take on how therapy can change someone’s world. In the very brief sequences we see of Jack with his therapist it all seems overtly obvious, and his advice to Jack is full of the sort of pithy phrases you might see on tacky posters; it’s not quite “Live, Laugh, Love “, but it’s not a million miles away from it either.
The central concept is an endearing one which many may benefit from hearing, it’s just a slight shame the therapy sessions aren’t given a little extra depth. Still, Williams has created a very likeable, sympathetic lead character, and a very funny one at that, who delivers a number of laugh out loud lines which meant the play was consistently enjoyable throughout.
Written and performed by: Zac Williams.
Jack Goes to Therapy: A (Somewhat) Romantic Comedy has finished it’s run at the Bread and Roses.