One of the reasons we go to the theatre is to feel. It’s that skin-tingling, pulse-quickening, heart-expanding sensation that comes from being in a room together sharing stories. That particular feeling, which we’ve had to do without for so much of the last 14 months, is stirred up almost immediately by Lauryn Redding’s joyful new solo show.
Something else I’ve missed during lockdown is the sweaty, beer-scented togetherness of the live gig. Though we’re masked and socially distanced rather than swaying shoulder to shoulder, Bloody Elle brings something of that spirit to the Royal Exchange. Striding on with beer in hand, toasting the audience before picking up a guitar, Redding has both the musician’s swagger and the storyteller’s confiding tone. In words and song, she weaves the tale of the eponymous Elle: working at Chips and Dips by day, gigging by night, each day blurring into the next until Eve erupts into her life.
What follows is a classic chalk-and-cheese love story. Elle is a working-class northern lass, living in a high-rise flat; Eve grew up in the home counties and went to boarding school. Their passionate attraction surprises them both and they embark on a giddy but secretive summer of love. Whether in her writing, her performance or her songs – which soar in a moment from the humdrum to the heart-swelling – Redding beautifully captures the feeling of infatuation in all its intensity and awkwardness.
While Redding tells this semi-autobiographical story as Elle, she also transforms effortlessly into the various other characters populating Elle’s world. It’s a performance that fills every last inch of the Royal Exchange auditorium, which – despite the limited audience – buzzes with energy after more than a year of lying dormant. Bryony Shanahan’s production embraces this in-the-round setting, moving fluidly across the raised, paint-speckled platforms of Amanda Stoodley’s set.
Bloody Elle is an ode to the queer experience, to being oneself, to the joy and terror of falling in love, and to the thrill of live performance. Some moments are clumsy or over-earnest, but Redding’s show remains – like first love – irresistible.
Bloody Elle is at the Royal Exchange, Manchester, until 17 July.
