REVIEW: Crushed Shells and Mud, Southwark Playhouse ✭✭✭

Crushed Shells and Mud

Southwark Playhouse

5th October 2015

3 Stars

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They say that football is a game of two halves and Crushed Shells and Mud, currently playing at the Southwark Playhouse, is very much the same.

The uneven production is the second I’ve seen this week about life-threatening pandemics (just what you need on a dark winter’s evening!). In an eerie and creepy village by the English coast, well-meaning oddball Derek has his life shaken up by the arrival of the beautiful and mysterious Lydia. Alas, she has a secret, which threatens to ruin their unusual friendship, as well as Lydia’s attraction for the bullying and insecure Vince.

There’s a dystopian feel to the whole piece, although the treatment of ‘diseased’ Lydia could easily be an allegory for the stigma attached to HIV/AIDS sufferers in the 1980s. The strongest segments of the play are its portrayal of the growing sense of totalitarianism; the charismatic Peter preaches peace and love but emerges as the leader of a radical group. He is intent on sowing division and hatred and taking the impressionable Vince along with him.

These political touches work really well, giving the production some extra depth and subtlety. Ellan Parry’s battered and fading set helps to set the mood, featuring what appeared to be a real life caravan at the centre of the stage.

Although Ben Musgrave’s script starts strongly and sets up an excellent first half cliffhanger, it goes badly downhill after the interval. The dialogue, which was previously sharp and dramatic, becomes frequently clichéd and predictable, mainly due to a developing romantic subplot between Derek and Lydia. This storyline stretches credibility in itself – the way the characters were played implied a fairly vast age gap. The ending also features a fairly blatant and equally implausible deus ex machina, tieing up the loose ends far too neatly.

The brilliant Alex Lawther (best known as the young Alan Turing in The Imitation Game) puts in a sterling performance as the lovable yet weird Derek. He’s one of the finest young actors I’ve seen on stage, blessed with perfect comic timing and a talent for playing vulnerable roles. The character of Derek is well written (he has his own very particular way of speaking), but Lawther gives him a series of quirks and mannerisms that make him feel fully rounded.

Lydia (played by Hannah Britland of Fresh Meat fame) initially seemed fairly underwritten and one-note, but she is given far more to do as the play progresses and puts in a strong performance. Alexander Arnold is capable of being both fierce and vulnerable as the troubled Vince; his well-played scenes with Lawther’s Derek are genuinely uncomfortable to watch.

Also worthy of note is Simon Lenagan, playing the demagogic Peter. It would have been far too easy to play him as a demonic rabble rouser, but Lenagan’s portrayal is more intelligent, showing how contemptible characters are often capable of being likeable and charming as well. His hate-filled rants were passionate and persuasive and yet also terrifying and menacing; I hope he never runs for political office!

Crushed Shells and Mud starts well and features some wonderful performances. However, somewhere in the second half it, unfortunately, gets well and truly stuck.

Crushed Shells And Mud runs until the 24th October at Southwark Playhouse