‘How Love is Spelt’ review
‘I recommend it without hesitation.’
I’ll be upfront that ‘How Love is Spelt’ is not generally my thing, genre-wise. Or at least, that I was the expectation that I’d come with. But that was swiftly disproven; not so much because the play itself exceeded expectations, though its tender moments of loneliness and grief were wonderfully sincere, but because of what the spectacular cast and production team did with the show.
I’ll start with the set. This is the first show I’ve seen in the SU cafe, and when I carried the mattress down for a favour two days before opening night, I was curious as to how they planned to transform what is a rather standard cafe into the mess of many bedrooms they demand. They did it not just capably, but with exceptional flare, tact and organization. I should have known from the excellent publicity that lighting was a stylistic strong point of a team headed by Director Katie Procter, and her assistants Anna Ao and Phoebe Murray. The cascade of soft-light lamps, fairy lights and the dreaded, surgical ‘big light’ created a superb microclimate; the flat immediately becoming not just real but immersive: that melting-point, hazy glow of afters at once reminiscent and intoxicating.
However, this immersion must be rewarded primarily to the performers, among whom there was not a single slump in energy, charisma and chemistry throughout a solid runtime. The play is separated into five duologues, so I’ll start with the one recurring feature of each before going in chronological order.
Neve Kidson is fantastic. Peta (not Petra) is a strange role, never quite the main role in any of her own stories, but saddled with the responsibility of holding each duologue, with its oscillating tones and subjects, together. She does so brilliantly. Anyone who’s treated boards at some point will be sick of the phrase that “acting is reacting”, but Kidson embodies this mantra with a deft touch and vulnerability that feels so fundamentally vivid and raw that you can’t bear to let Peta go by the end. Muted when called upon, steadfast and firm when asked to be, Kidson navigates pangs of loneliness, confusion, regret and optimism with flawless fluidity, juggling this complex soup of post-adolescent sufferings without breaking stride.
Matthew Lo is hilarious as Joe. His character isn’t a good person by any stretch, and even less of a tactful one, but Lo’s comic timing makes their section together eminently watchable. I found some of his more sincere, sombre lines got slightly lost amongst the various flashes of cringe-inducing comedy, but that never detracted from the rest of the performance. Flynn Harris Brannigan’s portrayal of nebbish, conflicted History teacher Steven is so naturalistic, I felt a bit weird watching him come out for the curtain call as a demonstrably different person. He too, had superb comic timing throughout, and handled moments of emotional sincerity, loneliness and desperation with a heart-aching vulnerability and realism. I sound like a broken clock, but such compliments stand for the whole cast; it was the strongest element of the show, and Harris Brannigan embodied it to a tee. His final, inevitable exit after lulling Peta to sleep is truly sobering, and made for a very profound ending to the first act.
Grace Graham brings the energy as Chantelle, awakening the audience immediately with bursts of witty sufferings. She too feels so eminently real, and Graham handles the non-committal pangs of her character with real maturity and kindness. I thought moments of this section dragged slightly, but the same can be said for all of the second act, so this may be more attributable to writing than any directorial or performance choices. Indeed, some of this second section proved a clinic for directorial choices, with the blocking forever dynamic and fluid, without feeling forced or orchestrated; rather, the whole thing melts into a stunning naturalism that may delude the audience into saying that none of these conversations were ever touched.
Olivia Brown is uncanny as Marion in the best possible way; as in, I feel like I have met Marion on multiple occasions, and she’s bizarrely superimposed herself into this play I’m watching. Playing an older character is no mean feat but Brown makes light work of it, capturing the middle-aged idiosyncrasies with real wit and charm. When she gets onto her daughter, however, I would have liked slightly more of a tone shift; whilst the subtlety of Brown’s performance was superb, largely very effective, in these moments her grief, though obviously and tragically suppressed, felt slightly too channelled into using Peta as a replacement.
Finally, Laurie Stephen Davidson’s Colin was powerful from the moment of entrance. Davidson is transfixing on stage, navigating probably the toughest duologue of the five, script-wise, with vivid, substantial emotional heft and sincerity. Sometimes the characterisation slipped in places, I would have liked to have seen a cagier Colin at points earlier in their section, but Davidson’s performance was nevertheless superb in its energy, honesty and nuance.
How Love is Spelt is not really my thing. But this performance came close to proving me dead wrong. I recommend it without hesitation.
By Horatio Holloway.
‘How Love is Spelt’ performs on Saturday 23rd November, at 19:30, in Durham Students’ Union cafe.