At what point does infatuation tip over into something darker and more destructive? There’s actually a term for it – limerence – and this is the unsettling undercurrent of Tanya-Loretta Dee’s promising debut monologue, in which she also stars. There are very interesting ideas at play here, particularly to do with the fine line between sexual desire and something much wilder, more animalistic and untameable. But the production needs more fire and intensity. It unfolds at a slight distance and never quite pulls us deep inside this young woman’s fevered breakdown.
The story revolves around Bex, who works in a Peckham party shop by day and has an awful lot of sexual fantasies by night. Into Bex’s life walks James. With his middle-class wardrobe and middle-of-the-road job, James is from a different world. At first, he is Bex’s fantasy prince. But as their relationship fractures and warps, Bex’s fantasies turn in on her, separating her from real life and the people who care about her.
Dee develops an intimate rapport with the audience, helped by a flurry of witty asides. She has a good stab at bringing the other characters in Bex’s world to life, including her harassed best friend Greta, and her distant and disturbed mother (easily the most interesting character). But James is never anything more than a caricature: a bit of a brute who is easy to loathe and hard to like. That takes a lot of heat out of the production and makes Bex’s suffocating infatuation very tricky to buy into.
There is also something just a little too controlled about Dee’s performance. She never lets herself off the leash. Instead, it feels as though Cheng Keng’s restless lighting design and Mydd Pharo’s abstract and moody set – a barren wasteland filled with long grass and grotty mattresses – are left to create an eerie mood never quite matched by the script or performance. Director Sophie Ellerby could have pushed things much further, surrendering to the darkness and chaos that glimmer beneath this script but are never given full expression.
At Theatre503, London, until 29 November
