Monogamy - Tour and Park Theatre, London

I saw this at Guildford yesterday. As you'd expect on a fine spring day and with the above description, the performance was well-attended and the audience enjoyed the humour in this play - as did I. However, though I know Torben Betts was a protege of Alan Ayckbourn (now apparently doing well on the basis of his own reputation), this latest play is so Ayckbourn-like - though fortunately not Ayckbourn-lite - that I realised afterwards that, had I seen it without knowing the author's name and had to guess, Ayckbourn is the name which would immediately come to mind.

Not that that's a bad thing and the play is enjoyable in its own right, though imo the developments are utterly lacking in credibility, right down to the apocalyptic ending - but what has happened to the author's own voice?

NB:  for fans of Janie Dee, she works astonishingly hard and unlike the other characters, is never off-stage, so I hope she has a strong constitution!

So who’s playing the Diana Ross part? 🙂

Well this is a mess, I mean it's entertaining enough and it got a fair few laughs but as a piece of writing it's all over the place. Dee is great but her character is a mess of contradictions, it felt like he introduced the religious angle to make sense of her character and tie the whole thing together but it didn't work.

It also felt about 20 years out of date, actually set this in the 1980's or early 90's and the whole thing would have made more sense.

I wouldn't bet on it . . . 

Saw this tonight. Air conditioned Theatre so happy to sit there though I was thinking of an early bath...ha ha.. because it was so predictable. The posters above are right, very Ayckbournish but not sustained in the way he does it. I too was concerned about the setting, was it retro, was it 50s or 80s and then of course it became clear it was now with the mobile phone funny stuff. Very well acted for what it is. Some athletic stuff from the father. Ten minutes too long. Maybe twenty minutes too long. Maybe....