Glass. Kill. Bluebeard. Imp.
3.5 stars
As the title implies, this performance was comprised of four different plays, each increasing in length – the final play, ‘Imp’, was one hour long. ‘Glass’ tells the story of a girl made of glass, discussing important themes of abuse. However, this aspect didn’t seem to quite fit in as I felt that it would have been equally as impactful if the short sketch was performed without the girl being made of glass. ‘Kill’ was a bizarre monologue by ‘God’ talking about the violence and absurdity of the Greeks who invented all these Gods who don’t actually exist. ‘Bluebeard’s Friends’ centres around a series of conversations between four people whose friend has just been found to have been a serial killer who murdered all six of his wives, as they try to wrap their heads around it. Lastly, ‘Imp’ is the tale of an elderly pair who live together and get visits from a homeless man and an Irish girl, who eventually form a romantic relationship.
There is not a single bad performance from any actor in any of the four plays. The talent on the stage was remarkable, particularly the rapport between Deborah Findlay and Toby Jones in both ‘Bluebeard’s Friends’ and especially in ‘Imp’. Miriam Buether’s set designs were wondrous, particularly that of the second play, where the stage consisted of a floating cloud with ‘God’ sitting atop it, and also the third play, in which bloodied wedding dresses hung in the background throughout the whole sketch. But for me, none of this takes away from the fact that I found the plays to be just a bit pointless – it felt like nothing happened in the entire 2 hours of performance, and whilst captivating to watch the performances, it was too long a period of time for nothing to have occurred. Simply put, it didn’t feel very satisfying.
I walked out of the theatre feeling very confused as I heard everybody nattering around me about how profound and wonderful the show was. Then a few days later a whole slew of five-star reviews came out and I found myself even more confused. It is not often I give such an average rating for a play; usually I find something to rave about, whether it’s the acting, the set design, the writing, or meaning, but there is an overwhelming sense throughout this whole play that it is definitely aimed exclusively at the bourgeoisie of London. Ultimately, there was no action, there was no obvious meaning or relevance. I know Caryl Churchill is an extremely well-regarded playwright, but perhaps this type of play just suits certain types of people; evidently much of the audience enjoyed it so I’d still give it a go and see if you engage with the commentary. Or perhaps the meaning was hidden deep within the subtext, but I just personally feel that for a play to be meaningful it needs to be accessible to the average person on some level. Whilst the set was great and there were some fantastic performances, I don’t think it did enough to outweigh the lack of substance nor did it justify the price.
