Review: Two, Greenwich Theatre

Immersive theatre can be hit or miss. Will it be a fun, engrossing production, or a painful few hours spent desperately trying to avoid eye contact with performers? It’s always a coin toss. In Two, Greenwich Theatre’s bar is transformed into a local pub. The audience is spread around the room at tables and on bar stools, gaining insights into the lives of the pub’s owners and their patrons – all of whom are played by Kellie Shirley and Peter Caulfield.

The duo’s ability to so strongly differentiate the many characters they play is a testament to their skill and physicality. With each segment only a few minutes long, they don’t have long to sell the stories – but they do. Particularly affecting is their portrayal of an abusive relationship, which is so well done and believable that it’s a surprise no audience members have thrown their glasses at Caulfield’s head. Painful to watch yet almost impossible to look away from, it’s a highlight of the piece.

Some of the vignettes are more compelling than others, but each gives the two actors an opportunity to showcase their varied talents. Accent choices are slightly confusing, making it difficult to know where the play is meant to be set (there are a lot of northern and scouse voices here, juxtaposed with southern and RP characters), but it’s not distracting enough to draw attention from their stories.

As a result of the focus on different pub patrons, the story of the central couple – the pub’s owners – loses some of its emotional potency. We’re drip-fed information about them, how they’ve come to own the establishment and the foundations of their relationship, but the real tragedy and source of their conflict only makes itself known in the final few minutes of the play. Despite the somewhat odd construction of the piece, Shirley and Caulfield really make it work. Their ability to draw the audience into their characters in such short spaces of time is commendable, and the attention to detail as they switch between personalities is impressive.

Equally impressive is the practical coordination of the whole production. Rushing in and out of doors, the pair change outfits with incredible speed and manage to always have the right props on hand. Only a few costume changes take place ‘on stage’, and are smooth enough to be unobtrusive. The whole thing is expertly managed, and goes off without a bump.

At points, the music is a little too loud, the picture of a buzzing pub slightly too realistic in the sense that it’s hard to hear what characters are saying. It’s a shame, because there are some excellent lines in here – when a stag party turns up, the couple prepare as if for war, making sure to raise the prices of pints before they get to the bar. There’s a lot of humour, despite the heavy subject matters discussed. Life, death, love, and hate all convene in this space, a space that in some ways barely exists anymore. The play was written in 1989, and pub culture has changed massively since. There’s a melancholic nostalgia to proceedings, a reminder of lost community.

While the world of Two may no longer exist, everything that the characters are dealing with still does. Elderly visitors reflect on life and death, couples bicker, and grief dominates lives. It’s a touching piece, deeply entertaining and flaunts powerful performances from Shirley and Caulfield.

Writer: Jim Cartwright
Director: James Haddrell
Set Design: Jana Lakatos

Two plays in the Greenwich Theatre Bar until Sunday September 21.