21 – 23 May

We all know about the ‘coming of age’ stories most often found in cinema.

This is one of those generational stories about the next life stage, the ‘new parent’ time of life.

Each generation has fun with the stereotypes of its own time, its fads and predilections, always enjoying pricking the various bubbles that they tend to inflate for themselves. Stereotypes soon emerge that cry out for caricature. Some tropes hang around from generation to generation and others may be newly minted by and for the times which as we know are always a-changing. Whilst ‘coming of age’ involves a riot of hormones so the ‘new parent’ time of life throws up a jungle of new psychological and social tests and hurdles to navigate. Central to the new nest of social vipers is the question of ‘other parents’. Party Season wades in swinging on all fronts. Xander, dad of Felix, has been away to uni and finds he has some problems with his roots when childhood friend and old flame, Bea, turns up at the same party with her daughter, Maya.

Celia who seems always to be on the verge of a nervous breakdown, strung out with nervous energy that exhibits in a repeated rictus grin, is the not-to-be-denied keeper of the WhatsApp group that Xander falls foul of in a moment of drunken indiscretion. Her party for son, Aonghus, has set the bar high with fastidious attention to detail and a children’s entertainer. For Maya, her mum, the unconventional Bea has engaged a D.J. and sweet treats with enough E numbers to get the children banned from most sporting activities.

Amongst all the jolly fun poking the show manages to raise some interesting social questions, such as why is gentrification so bad when it is often people who have gone away to university coming back to an area with greater expectations? Again it manages some poignant moments, as when after the trauma of thinking he had lost his son, following a disgraceful drunken episode, Xander is forced to do some reassessment of his relationship with his own father and come to terms with his own identity.

The cast have fun playing both adults and kids in the spontaneous, infectious way that devised theatre can often produce in a studio setting.  Whilst at first I didn’t feel the show translated well from the intimacy of the Wardrobe Theatre, by the end of the show they’d won me over as the play developed changes of mood and depth.

★★★★☆ Graham Wyles 22 May 2026