Michael Wilcox's latest play whiles away a happy couple of hours. But it's not funny enough to be totally entertaining, not sharp enough to count as satire and is too insubstantial to really pass comment on the ethics of making and spending money, and the difficulties of being a socialist in the New Labour, e-commerce world.
What it does do is create a real, believable world in the basement of the Red Flag charity shop in Newcastle, ruled over by the imperious Mrs Steinberg, a card-carrying communist who admits "I'm less Stalinist than I used to be". Here the light-fingered April, canny Janice and sweet-natured, gay Peter provide their labour for free, each finding a way of happily clawing back what they want or need.
Then young Matty arrives on work experience. He has never heard of Marx and in Mrs Steinberg's five-week absence sees an opportunity to transform the rundown charity shop into a thriving, profits-motivated business whose heart is in the basement where the computer gives internet access to an international market of buyers. For the rechristened New Red Flag shop and its volunteers with their profits-related bonus schemes, it's a case of rags to riches, almost overnight.
The clash between old-style socialist values and New Labour entrepreneurship is never given more than cursory attention, and the main enjoyment of the evening comes from the soap opera-like developments in the workers' personal lives, from Janice's "shag of a lifetime" to the burgeoning relationship between Matty and Peter, sweet on the surface but pregnant with violence and power. But like so much else in this play it is not sufficiently developed.
This is so close to being a much better play that it seems a pity the Bush hasn't helped to push the promising script that further mile. But there are no problems with Natasha Betteridge's snappy production or the performances, particularly from relative newcomers Paul Nicholls, who plays Matty with a sly, knowing smile, and Aidan Meech, whose Peter is like a lovable, trusting puppy who will always end up kicked.
To July 8. Box office: 020 8743 3388.
