Hampstead Downstairs 2023

I thought this was okay, 2.5 stars. I liked the theme - about absence and loss, with a central character missing, but also everyone either witholding love, neglecting their loved ones or suffering because of it, but the overarching sea theme - mythology, storytelling, green/blue lighting, repetitiveness, toy lobster - worked less well.

Two of the characters (the daughters) were intensely irritating, even though they made sense psychologically (one in her 20s but behaving like an adolescent, the other smoking and drinking her way through a mostly unwanted pregnancy), but the others were interesting and all were well performed. June Watson even managed to make a mythical creature relatable.

But the slow and unchanging pace was hard to take, and often meant long periods of watching characters make coffee or peel veg. I assume it was meant to mimic the waves we could hear in the background, and I did find it quite hypnotic at times, but it could be crashingly dull too.

So some parts interesting, maybe not a success overall, but I liked what (I think) it was trying to do.

Yes, Sea Creatures - sorry, I forgot this was a general thread for Hampstead Downstairs.

Good point about the programme. I only had time of a quick skim read beforehand, but it helped...

I really liked "Sea Creatures" this afternoon. While we witness day to day banal scenes, the play wants us to think about the meaning of life, and I did, so that's really something.

Some spoilers follow. . .

There is a line about humans evolving from the Ocean, so it's pretty clear that the Sea Creatures of the title are us, and this is a play less about plot than about how we sea creatures should spend the time we have.

June Watson's mystical character clues us in that if one lives a life without agency (hers has been stolen from her), even an apparently good one, looked at from the outside, it's awful.

So Tom Mothersdale's Mark, who has the most agency, but has fallen into misery, because he has lost his love, is the key character here. He has so much passion for life: not only is he looking for his love, but he seeks a genuine connection with her family members: he has written an appraisal and critique of the work of the family matriarch, his love's mother, and seeks her opinion; he has learned how to cook every dish in the world and seeks to share his knowledge; he flirts with his missing love's sister (though she evades him); he participates in the games the family plays; he is open to new things and finding new reasons to live.

Other characters are less open to change: Grace Saif's Toni is in a state of arrested adolescence, a kind of Peter Pan who refuses to grow up or change; Pearl Chanda's George hates her own pregnancy and actively works against it, smoking and drinking; Geraldine Alexander's Shirley wanders through rooms in a self-absorbed zombie state; Thusitha Jayasandara's Sarah, the matriarch's partner, seems thoroughly contented with her lot, though she aspires to nothing new.

The play is suffused with the sounds of the sea and nature (seagulls and storms), which remind us of the oblivion we came from and which we'll return to, as well as the repetitive nature of our days in between.

The question the play seems to ask is whether the essential tenet of Buddhism is right or wrong: is it painful to desire, suggesting we might better off using the little time we have like complacent zombies, or, confronted with loss and obstacles, should we seek "a brave new world that has such people in it" (like Miranda in the Tempest) even if so many people in the world are living in contented or discontented zombie states?

The question seems genuinely open, but my heart was completely with Mothersdale's character, and his quest to follow his desires, to learn things, to teach things, to participate in things, to have agency in everything.

I'm downgrading this from 4 stars to 3 and a half stars cos it clearly was losing some members of the audience to sleep, and that's a shame, as it offers so much that's interesting to think about, and hasn't found a way to get enough people thinking about them. Illuminating and entrancing and wonderfully difficult, nonetheless. I really enjoyed it.

I enjoyed this slightly more than Blackout Songs but not quite three stars. Wildly overlong, strange artificial characters and I couldn't get a sense of what the purpose of it all was. Drifted pretty badly in the middle and during the monologue. And the toy lobster was plain weird. Did like the lighting though. If I, maybe unfairly, compare this to Islander that managed to evoke a much stronger sense of the liminal spaces next to the sea.

Did anyone see Biscuits for Breakfast then?

We saw it Monday and it was... okay. The two cast are really good but also appear to be in different plays. It was rare that I saw anything in the relationship between them. The premise and so much about the food banks as in the programme doesn't come until late and then instead of exploring that it really just takes off into other directions. Lots of cliches and lots of just really odd pieces of the story.

A bit of a shame as there was a lot of promise in their meeting and initial date over dinner and some of the cooking stuff works really well but overall, left like it was a missed opportunity.

Though again £5 preview tickets downstairs are pretty unbeatable value...

Saw Biscuits for Breakfast earlier this week, and enjoyed it overall, but as others have said it does feel a bit underdeveloped. The two cast members give good and engaging performances, but the play just feels a bit rushed, especially the whole food bank story, which should be the crux of the play in my opinion.

Definitely glad I saw it, but not one I'd rush back to.

3 stars.