“Do you really want to hurt me? Do you really want to make me cry?” The poignant tones of Boy George appropriately play us out of this three act human hinterland, a brilliantly observed piece by playwright Gillian Plowman about mental illness and human need. The play won the 1988 Verity Bargate Award, and is gaining more relevance and stature as time moves on.
Two odd and unlikely couples wounded by breakdown and forced out of psychiatric care are limping along together in their tiny council flats. Plowman is brave enough to show us that the monkeys on the backs of these protagonists can provide as much humour as they do pathos.
Julia (Karrie Breen) and Robin (Francis Iles) in the first act, then Oz (Daryl Bennett) and Bunny (Philip Goudal) in the second, reveal a world of angst tempered with farcical role-playing and situation enactment as the characters chaotically reach out towards the mirage of a ‘normal’ life, but are thwarted by fears of failure and rejection too bitter to endure. No small achievement, the four actors manage to give the piece increasing momentum throughout its two and a bit hours as it progresses towards a manic emotional showdown when all four finally get together at an arranged ‘party’ in the men’s flat.
Occasionally Plowman allows individuals to completely ‘lose it’. Julia explodes with the enormity of the fact she has suffocated her young son because he got in the way of a fulfilling relationship with an uncaring husband. Robin has made money from sex in the past, and now fights a horror of being touched. Former postman Oz, never fully recovered from his mother’s untimely death, takes solace from wearing his old postman’s hat and pretending to go out on his round, while flatmate Bunny is still mentally tortured by the memory of trying to balance the demands of his previous managerial job and his now estranged wife. All are sad. But Plowman reminds us that no life is entirely grey. In the flatmates’ disabilities she finds extraordinary empathy alongside some clown-like mayhem, without ever patronising or undermining the humanity bubbling very close to the surface.
I would suggest this play is required viewing for the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. With Work Capability Assessment now hanging over the most vulnerable in our communities, Plowman adroitly captures how those who have ceased to cope can descend into a state of terrified inertia and retreat. Her wit illuminates this twilight world, showing how fear of life itself can reduce people to parodies of themselves. Yes we are right to laugh at our human frailties, but Me and My Friend will always serve as a timely reminder that we also need to find the kindness and cash to care for them. The tight black space that is the Alma Theatre is the perfect spot to experience the play. Recommended. ★★★★☆ Simon Bishop 12/01/15
