Upon a recommendation from the man who runs the local playwrighting group in Exeter, my friend, the playwright and I, the actor, went to see The Same Deep Water As Me. We are getting into a rhythm now, I cycle across town in rush hour traffic to queue up to buy the cheap day tickets, she will buy the expensive theatre-bar priced drinks at the interval. I duly cycled across town, arrived at the Donmar at 9am to find that there was no queue at all, so the day tickets were ours. At the Donmar, it seems that they only recently changed the system for day tickets and they are in fact for standing tickets, to stand at the back of the balcony. We don't mind, we just want to see as much good theatre as we can, tickets are bought.
So I was waiting outside the theatre for my friend, who was running late because she had only just finished work at ten to seven, and who should I see walk past me and into the theatre... but Niamh Cusack, of Radio 4's Ulysses which I listened to on podcast whilst walking laps barefoot around the field at Poltimore House during rehearsals for open air Shakespeare last year. Then, shortly after that... Kristin Scott Thomas, stealer of my heart and star of films such as Four Weddings and Il y a Longtemps Que Je T'aime. I started getting heart palpitations, I couldn't believe I was standing less than a meter from someone who just months ago I had been watching in Old Times at the Harold Pinter. Already, I was having the best night of my life, just knowing that I was going to be in the audience with such incredible actors. As if that wasn't good enough, when standing in our spot at the back of the theatre, one of the ushers came and offered us seats because a couple of people hadn't turned up – we got upgraded! As if to first class! We were sitting three seats away from Niamh and two rows from the side of the stage, a perfect spot.
The play opened with Nigel Lindsay (who I have just realised was in Four Lions, one of the best films ever made) and Daniel Mays (who I best know from Plus One, a short tv series in which he was a little over obsessed with Duncan from Blue). They were both solicitors in a personal injury firm. The play began with some incredibly witty and outright hilarious dialogue, the language was crude, there was lots of talk of Greggs and herbal teas and it was a reminder that offices now are not how they used to be, swearing is the norm, broken fans also, it reeked of realism and the humour came from that. The whole text was incredibly current, this was also what made it so funny, but at the same time, it made me realise how quickly this text will date. I realised that this was a show to watch and enjoy in the moment, rather than one to buy the script to take home and re-read.
Although the script was funny, the story line was getting serious, a school friend turned up, played by Marc Wootton, who had a proposition, they worked together to create situations in which a personal injury claim would arise, for example, a staged car bump with a supermarket delivery van, so that the supermarket would pay out compensation, settling out of court. The only problem was that one of the claims ends up going to court. There follows the court scene where the instigator and his pregnant wife have to testify to what happened when the Tesco van bumped into them, knowing full well that they were not actually in the car when it happened. Also giving a statement was the driver of the Tesco van, played perfectly by Isabella Laughland (who I recognised from Harry Potter, but is better known for roles at The National). The court scene, for me, was a little obvious and a little cliché, what followed with the argument in the office and the final scene was all, also, a little obvious. The writing was so witty and well delivered, that it maybe masked a slightly dull storyline. However the storyline did serve the purpose if the purpose was to create an entertaining play with a simple point, rather than one with a complex message. There is no law to say that theatre has to make you leave and discuss the big issues raised constantly for the next twenty four hours, I know I would do well to remember this sometimes!
A comment that my friend made was about the characters. There was a definite class divide and the play was perhaps a little judgemental of the working class characters. In fact, all of the characters had a slightly two dimensional feel. I don't think this was in the acting, I think the acting was very well delivered, I think the storyline and pace meant that there wasn't enough room to give the characters too many other dimensions. Again, was this really a problem? Maybe not, they were perfectly formed caricatures, slick, funny and real, whilst being recognisable as certain 'types' of people.
I absolutely loved the set. The office was fantastic, even down to the detail of having the lights in the ceiling at the back of the stage, and then hanging out in front so you really felt like the wall had just been cut away to let us in. Also the set of the court was spot on, down to the colour of the chairs and the musical interlude between scenes was upbeat and tension building whilst not being too noticeable, a very good choice.
The play was tackling a very big idea; the current compensation culture, people wanting to earn a quick buck easily. It was a magnifying glass on a very small part of a much larger culture, which, I would propose, also includes reality tv shows, kiss and tell magazine stories, baring skin and getting paid, buying a lottery ticket and making your millions, anything to avoid putting in hard graft. The play did bring up the morality of the situation, but other than one character saying it's bad, one saying it's ok and another being conflicted, it didn't delve particularly deep into the issue. But then maybe people in general don't really delve very deep into thinking about it, you either would get involved in it or you wouldn't, how many of us really think about every positive, negative and grey shade in between of every thing that we do?
What I liked about this piece was the realism, the fly on the wall
style and the fact that, having worked in offices for many years,
this was very true to life. That that was what made it enjoyable and
outright hilarious at times, but I definitely preferred the first
half.
The Same Deep Water As Me ran at the Donmar Warehouse from 1st August to 28th September 2013.
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