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Bear with me: Sun Bear @ParkTheatre

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If The Light House is an uplifting tale of survival, Sarah Richardson’s Sun Bear gives a contrasting take on this. Sarah plays Katy. We’re introduced to Katy as she runs through a list of pet office peeves with her endlessly perky coworkers, particularly about coworkers stealing her pens. It’s a hilarious opening monologue that would have you wishing you had her as a coworker to help relieve you from the boredom of petty office politics.  But something is not quite right in the perfect petty office, where people work together well. And that is her. And despite her protesting that she is fine, the pet peeves and the outbursts are becoming more frequent. As the piece progresses, maybe the problem lies in a past relationship, where Katy had to be home by a particular hour, not stay out late with office colleagues and not be drunk enough not to answer his calls. Perhaps the perky office colleagues are trying to help, and perhaps Katy is trying to reach out for help. It has simple staging

Living pretty: Nightfall @_Bridgetheatre

Living in the country never looked better than in the sumptuousproduction of Nightfall. This play about life in rural Hampshire is currently playing at the Bridge Theatre. Desginer Rae Smith has created a farm backdrop that is beauty to behold even before any of the actors speak. Which is just as well since the night I saw it the show was delayed as one of the actors was caught in a very urban predicament: delays on the London transport network. Chis Davey’s lighting also evokes the sunsets over Hampshire.

But looks are deceiving as nobody wants to be there. Dad’s dead and left a pile of debt. The son, Ryan (Sion Daniel Young) is trying to make the farm work by siphoning off oil from a pipeline that cuts through the property. His best mate Pete (Ukweli Roach) is out of and jail helping him with his criminal enterprise.  The daughter, Lou (Ophelia Lovibond) is drifting in and out of jobs and a relationship. And mum (Claire Skinner) would rather just lounge about, barefoot, drinking a fine white wine.

There are so many contrivances that happen over the course of the piece that you could easily forget that it also doesn’t feel like its set on a farm. Unless rural decline is the result of ambivalence to farming.

It feels much more like the urban angst you’d find in Crouch End rather than rural Hampshire. Writer Barney Norris keeps things light and amusing, but you’ll struggle with finding much more here about life on the land. It does looks like it could be fabulous. And just like city living with all those drinks outside and nibbles from Marks and Spencer.

Directed by Laurie Sansom, Nightfall is at the Bridge Theatre, London’s newest and loveliest-looking theatre, until 26 May.

⭐️⭐️⭐️


Production photos by Manuel Harlan 

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