Beginning

Emotional Striptease

Beginning

by David Eldridge

Putney Arts Company at Putney Arts Theatre Studio until 18^th May

Review by Harry Zimmerman

Laura’s thrown a housewarming party at her new flat.  Danny is the last man standing.  It’s meant to be, isn’t it?  Or is it?  They are both single.  They both really like each other.  But can they take that final leap? 

David Eldridge’s play is a poignant real-time examination of relationships, with two emotionally vulnerable people reaching out at the end of a party; a wry, funny and touching meditation on the loneliness of being single in the era of social media dating. 

“I’m 38 and I’ve been sensible my whole life, Danny,” says Laura.  Tonight, though, things might, just might, turn out differently …. 

Laura is a 38-year-old managing director, who is left with the post-party detritus after a housewarming at her new Crouch End flat.  Danny is a 42-year-old recruitment consultant, whose career has never reached Laura’s high-flying status.  He is at the party merely as the “plus one” of a casual friend of Laura, and, as the play opens, he is the one remaining guest.

In addition to their jobs, Laura and Danny seem very different in many other ways.  She is a passionate Labour supporter, initially exuding self- confidence and capability.  Danny, awkward, a little gauche and hesitant, is apolitical, living with his mum and in awe of his Facebook enthusiastic nan. 

What the play captures well is the way that people’s emotions and desires are rarely in perfect synch.

Laura seems the more assured, sexually and professionally, yet, as the narrative progresses, we see a fundamental emptiness at the centre of a life which she later describes as “a shell of activity.”

Danny is the nervous, unsure one who, although he clearly fancies Laura, resists her initial praying manta type advances through a series of amusing evasion tactics including scrupulously stuffing the party leftovers into bin bags, and steadfastly refusing to sit beside her on the two-seat sofa that Laura continuingly pats invitingly.

This Putney Arts Theatre production, directed with great sensitivity by Ben Clare, captures perfectly the developing and changing relationship between Danny and Laura. 

The compactness of the theatre’s size enhances the overall experience of close, unvarnished intimacy, with the audience able to look into the whites of the actors’ eyes. 

Barney Hart Dyke’s and Simon Crump’s simple set design splendidly evokes the debris-strewn party detritus that forms the landscape for the action, while the subdued lighting from Peter Rees is absolutely right for the contemplative nature of much of the dialogue, with the occasional effective lighting fade at key moments.

The play runs for around one hour, forty minutes without an interval.  For this production, this is absolutely the right call.  This is not the type of production that benefits from a pause in the narrative.  It is a testament to the writing, direction and acting that the time flies by.  The audience is invested at all times in the progress of the changing relationship between Laura and Danny, and constantly intrigued about how the story will play out.

In a two-hander such as this, everything rests upon the shoulders of the actors.  The success, or otherwise of the production will stand or fall by their ability to make the characters believable, and the audience to care about what happens to them.  In this production, we are fortunate to have two consummate performers who effortlessly peel back the layers of their personalities to reveal the truths hidden deeply within.

Debra Bond’s Laura is, at first coquettish but clear sighted.  She wants Danny, and we are left in no doubt about that.  The gradual disintegration of her outward confidence and clear sightedness into an introspective emotional desolation, fuelled by a desire for a different life to that she has been living, is visceral and makes for occasional uncomfortable viewing.

Des Healy gives us a down to earth, rugged wariness whose gruff exterior conceals a profound shyness and self-doubt, stemming from the buried hurt of a failed marriage, and alienation from his little daughter.

Over the course of the play, both actors peel away the carefully constructed protective layers of their personalities in a play that leaves the audience caring deeply about them, and eager to see whether we are, indeed, witnessing a true “beginning.”

The narrative is full of awkward gaffes and wincing misfires, painful revelations and defensive stances.  There is a liberal, and confident, use of pauses in the dialogue, which never feel overly stretched.  Never has the consumption of a fish finger sandwich been so invested in meaning. 

Only actors confident in their own characterisation, and fully trusting in the abilities of their fellow performer, can develop the narrative in such a powerful way.  At all times, their performances do justice to the layered nuances of David Eldridge’s writing.

Whilst there is a core seriousness to the production, there are moments of well observed and executed comedy, both verbal and physical.  I enjoyed Danny’s rather jaundiced definition of Crouch End, Muswell Hill and Highgate as “…the Pesto Triangle.”  The sequence of awkward dancing, with Laura’s exuberance very much tempered by Danny’s ineffective and awkward “dad dancing” swaying, was very amusing: although I felt that this particular episode went on a tad too long.

This wry humour, always shot through with warmth and compassion, underpinned the key structure of this play; in short, Beginning is a kind of emotional striptease, peeling away the barriers and defences of its pair of needy, and ultimately unsatisfied, characters. 

This production is a superbly observed, funny and poignant piece of theatre, about being fortyish and single, hesitant yet hopeful, and, most of all, being open to falling in love again.  With a happy ending?

Try to catch this play if you can.  You will be well rewarded if you do.

Harry Zimmerman, May 2024

Photography by Ben Copping