Hangmen

Knotty Questions

Hangmen

by Martin McDonagh

Teddington Theatre Club at the Hampton Hill Theatre until 28^th September

Review by Brent Muirhouse

From the moment the lights dimmed in Hampton Hill Theatre, the black comedic tone of Martin McDonagh’s work immediately entered and held the space, not letting up until the final words were uttered by the titular hangman.  A deliberately dreary stage, defined only by a dated pub set in Oldham in Lancashire, was somewhat perpendicular to the quick-witted and sharply comic narrative it held within.  McDonagh’s penmanship – crisp, biting, and wickedly funny as anyone who has seen Three Billboards, Seven Psychopaths, or In Bruges will attest to – shines in Teddington Theatre Company’s revival of his story of executioners, (presumed) murderers, and (presumed) bystanders.

The opening scenes, played neatly under Dane Hardie’s direction, perfectly establishes the undercurrent of tension and genuinely grim genuine hilarity that propels the narrative forward.  David Webb as Harry Wade, Britain’s second-most famous and notorious hangman and bit-part pub landlord, dominates the stage with a performance that is magnetic to the fullest of the two poles, while his counterpart, the enigmatic Peter Mooney (an equally mesmerising Matt Tester, fitting the repeated description of looking ‘menacing’), slinks into the scenes like a snake poised to strike.  From their first exchange, the wit crackles like the dust on a Haribo Tangfastic; each wordplay, each quip carefully timed, hitting the mark like a masterfully loaded noose that Wade is all too familiar with.

The play’s standout feature is its ability to blend gleeful farce with the macabre, and the cast’s comic timing is almost impeccable.  Every beat, every pause, is delivered with a care that showcases the performers’ deep understanding of McDonagh’s dialogue.  This is exemplified by the deliberately slow responses and amusing interjections of pub regular Arthur (Jim Trimmer), always a step behind the conversations.  Each character – from Wade’s wife Alice (Juanita Al-Dahhan, in a wonderful turn to balance the toxic male energy) and ‘mopey’ daughter Shirley (Charlotte Griffiths, who pitches this wonderfully) to the somewhat tragic police detective (Dominic Lloyd) – plays a crucial role in keeping the rhythm snappy, the energy vibrant.

Despite the grim subject matter, Hangmen is anything but sombre.  The audience is swept along by the rapid-fire banter, laughing out loud at the dark absurdities of life and death as seen through McDonagh’s uniquely twisted lens – but the next minute grappling with the serious undertones around death and predatory behaviour.  The small-town pub becomes a theatre of larger existential questions, brilliantly cloaked in gallows humour, a setting foreshadowing the inn playing a big part in his recently Oscar-nominated Banshees of Inisherin on the silver screen.

What makes this production of Hangmen particularly special, however, is its joyful messiness.  The narrative is intentionally loose, meandering through subplots and conversations that, while appearing tangential, build a world thick with personality and contradiction.  Yet it must be commented that some of the words used in the narrative may be reflective of the time, creating an uncomfortable reminder of the past, could have been replaced without any loss in telling the tale for a performance in 2024.  This aside, the journey is wonderfully chaotic, like the drunken conversations that unravel at the end of a long night in a suitably dingy pub.  This dishevelled storytelling allows the cast to really revel in their roles, fully inhabiting McDonagh’s world where the stakes are life and death but the day-to-day feels as trivial as banter at the bar.

Director Hardie’s staging is tight, keeping the pace high without losing the depth of the characters.  The tension never truly dissipates, hanging over the pub and the people within it like the ever-present shadow of the past horrors of the death penalty.  Fiona Auty’s set design – a pretty exactly crafted replica of a Northern English pub – provides the perfect, claustrophobic backdrop for the unfolding drama, while the clever use of lighting by Rob Arundel and his time, often highlighting different parts of the stage and leaving others gloomy, accentuates the uneasy balance between light-hearted jokes and dark subject matter. 

By the time the final noose tightens, and the narrative reaches its suitably bleak yet fitting conclusion, the audience is left marvelling at the slick ensemble cast’s substantive mastery of McDonagh’s storytelling.  This is a play that revels in its contradictions: funny yet unsettling, mundane yet profound, leaving you simultaneously satisfied and eager for more.  TTC’s Hangmen is an ink-black comic triumph – a piece of theatre that lingered long after the final laugh has faded, as I left the Hampton Hill Theatre to the cold, autumnal air and the streetlights of suburbia.

Brent Muirhouse, September 2024

Photography by Sarah J Carter