Brian Coyle’s latest play lands on the London fringe scene, in this new two-handed production playing at The White Bear Theatre until the start of August. Guillermo Nazara shares his views on the show, to let us know if this edgy narrative ends up feeling rough.
We all have secrets that we carry along with our past. I, for example, got an email today calling me a perv after spying on me through my webcam. That’s not a secret, though – I’m just a bit of a bragger. Moving on. What would you do if your reality was suddenly turned into a grisly delusion after facing the most harrowing of events? They say that running away from your problems doesn’t make them disappear. But what if that’s the only method to prevent them from devouring you?
Brian Coyle’s new play, The Box, brings up one of the most essential aspects of our psyche: we often avoid the truth to create our own, just because we fear the pain that confronting those facts may be accompanied by. But by ignoring the harm, we only help it grow. Directed by Jonathan Woolf, the production stars Martin Edwards and Sarah Lawrie, stepping into the shoes of an apparently ordinary married couple. Playing some flirtatious make-believe games in the beginning, their seemingly naive joy will soon be dropped to reveal a much bleaker round – where blame, grief and resentment become the prize and penalty granted by the unprecedented misfortune that has and will keep haunting them for the rest of their lives.
Directed by Jonathan Woolf (and in the most delightfully ironic way, mirroring the themes and style from Edward Albee’s pungent masterwork), the show delivers a crude exploration of the complexities that both build and destroy the human soul. Two broken hearts, first connected by the fervent love that they professed to each other, swiftly realizing that, while their passion hasn’t withered, it has instead been turned into spiteful anger – serving as the last straw in their many desperate attempts to soothe the wound they’ll never be able to close.
An exceptional starting point overflowed with both dramatic and introspective opportunities, Coyle’s script manages to present a few solid topics that endow the narrative with maturity and gravitas. Yet, none of these subjects are given the chance to speak for themselves – resulting in what, in the end, looks like no more than a shy (and, most sadly, rather shallow) contribution. Featuring a slightly convoluted story arc, with its structure feeling underdeveloped and unable to execute any proper pacing, the plot is capable of drawing out some enticing elements all throughout – but loses its grip on the audience too many times by recurring to overused tools, while also struggling to inflict any more interest than the subtle sorrow we may experience for the characters’ plight.
Outlined as a “tale in disguise”, where the personages’ true identity is to be revealed later through the recount, the surprising effect the play aims for encounters some strong difficulty at pulling it through – preparing us for a climax we, most unfortunately, have already anticipated almost from the very opening, and providing us with hardly anything else to be allured by (let alone, embrace) from that moment on. In addition, though both Edwards and Lawrie give highly absorbing performances, their chemistry is not entirely flaunted – and though their inevitable distancing is a key component of the account, it’s that former bonding that sets up the foundation of their tragedy that appears to be missing.
A sizable effort carried out with care and determination, The Box assembles a hefty pile of ingredients to unleash an intense (and, if taken by the right hands, even groundbreaking) journey that can universally resonate with every person’s spirit. However, it misses its own point by forgetting the basics at the bottom of the heaps, while focusing too much on the clutter it so blatantly needs to get rid of. Parting from the same concept, a detailed revision that allows the story to boost both its originality and verity would transform it into an honestly forceful piece, finally granted with the touching factor it so drivenly tries to pursue – but which, as of now, wistfully appears to be out of stock.
The Box plays at London’s White Bear Theatre until 3 August. Tickets are available on the following link.