Only on till Saturday, I suggest you catch this gem of a play by Anita Vettesse at the Brewery Theatre Bristol while you have the chance. A perfectly barbed but witty domestic drama brought to life by a trio of startlingly good actors, this is the Tobacco Factory Theatres’ latest commission for its Play, a Pie and a Pint series in association with Sherman Cymru. It’s a great idea. You can relax in the Tobacco Factory bar lounge with your hot Pieminister pie and pint or glass of wine, before popping over the road to the Brewery for the play, all for the price of a ticket.
The Tobacco Factory has set the bar high for new works. This collaboration between director Gethin Evans and writer Anita Vettese is an exciting one – I’m already looking forward to their next production. This is Anita’s first play after a 20-year career as an actor, and Gethin’s first production as Associate Director of Sherman Cymru. They have been blessed with three outstanding performers who bring this sad, sometimes hilarious sitcom about loss and legacy to life.
Back at the family pub, a mother and her two children have reunited to scatter Dad’s ashes, and discuss finance. A sparky Hannah Donaldson plays debt-ridden daughter Kay. Edgy, frustrated, unloved, she has been flitting between failing start-ups. Now she really really wants whatever’s coming her way and fast.
Brother Tom (Stephen McCole) has belatedly returned from Africa with a surprise up his sleeve. Love flickers briefly between him and his bereaved mum Anne (Anne Lacey), a rather blown and bitter individual on the cusp of realising long denied freedoms. But the tension of his sister’s financial needs starts to undermine any pleasure in this ‘happy hour’. Before very long the triangular relationship starts to contort downwards into excoriating stand-offs, well-worn paths of old one is left to suspect.
Lacey gives a strong performance as a mother with little or no respect for her offspring. A no-frills straight-talking individual, Anne has no time for her daughter’s dabblings into life coaching and alternative therapy, or her son’s new life “in a mud hut”. And she’s certainly not taking Kay’s advice to move into sheltered housing… “I’m not prepared to shit in a commode.”
McCole gives Tom the self-confidence of one who has escaped to find another life in a distant world. Recognising the returning stony look on his mother’s face, he tortures her with descriptions of his loving relationship with who can articulate emotion. Donaldson meanwhile does a great job of portraying the brittleness and the growing feverishness of Kay.
Happy Hour is a fast-paced miniature masterpiece. It is skilfully written and perfectly executed. Anita Vettesse is a bright new talent to take note of, with a well-tuned eye and ear for human detail. Strongly recommended. ★★★★★ Simon Bishop 20th November 2015
