Robert (Harry Butler) thinks he ‘knows’ Patti (Máiréad Tyers), and at face value, there’s no reason to think otherwise. He has, after all, been invited into her flat, and Patti isn’t the sort of person who would have bedroom activity with just anyone. So it is a surprise when Patti retorts that, as far as she is concerned, he doesn’t really know her. But is this because there’s a self-esteem issue going on?
Set in Dublin, what isn’t said between the young pair (one hesitates to use the word ‘couple’) speaks as loudly as what is. It isn’t quite Normal People (the novel or the television series) in terms of broody non-verbal communication – if anything, these characters seem to talk and talk and talk until one of them puts their foot in it. The results are equally painful and hilarious to watch. Some of the references in the narrative are best understood by those with some familiarity with Dublin (I’ve only been there once, I must admit), but anyone who hasn’t been before will still find the play accessible.
Sex scenes are dramatized in what I can only describe as simultaneously the most graphic and the most conservative manner possible at the same time. The audience is either treated or subjected to every groan and moan, and yet the actors stand on opposite corners of the stage, remaining fully clothed. Staged in a Covid-secure manner, irrespective of what current public health restrictions may or may not be at any given point, nothing whatsoever is lost by not witnessing a physical representation of what is happening under the covers. I will leave it to others to deduce whether on-stage social distancing is a metaphor for the characters not being emotionally and psychologically as close to each other as they would either like to be, or think they are.
She lives on her own. Let’s just say he doesn’t, which raises a fresh set of challenges for a duo who are still trying to work out whether they are friends with benefits or something deeper. The script benefits hugely from being written by a younger writer (also Butler), who gives his characters authentic, if occasionally slightly brutal, manners of speaking. Neither actor leaves the stage for the duration of the play, which reaches its conclusion too soon, as though this were only the first half – that said, as I have often observed, it is better for a show to leave its audiences wanting more than to outstay its welcome.
The topics of conversation are broad and include almost anything from pornography to late-night gym sessions. It’s largely left to the audience to work out innermost thoughts – there are no asides or direct addresses – and while it’s a phase of young adulthood that some will relate to and others won’t recognise at all, it is both gripping and comical in equal measure.
Review by Chris Omaweng
“Dyu wanna come back to mine?”
A new comedy about what Patti and Robert say to each other when the lights are off and no one else is listening. After the swiping, the drinking, the small talk and the big talk. After the bedroom door is closed. This is intimacy – without the gory bits – and you get to have a look.
DIRECTOR Anthony Biggs
WRITER Harry Butler
CAST
Harry Butler as Robert
Máiréad Tyers as Patti
CREW
Stevie Frazier-Roberts – stage manager/operator
Cecilia Trono – set and costume design
Chris Drohan – sound design
Simon Beyer – lighting design
Developed at The Playground Theatre
https://www.theplaygroundtheatre.org.uk/
