The
Hub
Four
stars
The
wedding band are already playing when the audience enter the National Theatre
of Scotland’s scaled-up revival of David Greig and Gordon McIntyre’s play with
songs. A decade ago when it premiered, it was a zero-budget DIY rom-com with
two actors playing Helena and Bob, the oddest of couples who collide into one
another and accidentally go on a lost weekend to end them all. Today, Kate
Hewitt’s production has Eileen Nicholas and Benny Young play the older version
of Helena and Bob, unveiling their possibly unreliable memoirs and looking back
at their younger selves, played with sweaty abandon by Sarah Higgins and Henry
Pettigrew.
This
makes for a busy and at times frenetic ninety minutes, as the
cross-generational quartet cavort among discarded wooden tables, moving from
wine bar to bedroom to sex club, taking in some of Edinburgh’s lesser-spotted
sights as they go. At times this has the feel of an adult It’s a Knockout party
game set to music. The latter is provided by long-time stalwarts of Edinburgh’s
ever-fertile off-radar music scenes, bass player Clarissa Cheong and cellist
Pete Harvey, plus actor-musician Reuben Joseph.
While
the combination of Greig’s script and McIntyre’s songs remain a love letter to
Edinburgh, splitting the words between older and younger voices gives things an
extra layer of personal ennui. Helena and Bob lived to tell the tale of their
mad, debauched adventure, they can remember the first time, and are still
together and possibly still crazy after all these years. This isn’t, then, a
tale of lost opportunities, but of Bob and Helena’s willingness to take a
chance on each other in a way that changes their lives forever. As they grab at
every moment from the past, present and possible future, they make those
moments matter more with every telling.
The Herald, August 7th 2018
ends
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