Neil LaBute’s new play uses the same set of characters as Reasons to Be Pretty, seen at the Almeida in 2011. That offered a scathing indictment of the American obsession with physical perfection, while this piece is more concerned with the minor crises of romantic entanglement. While it’s perfectly pleasant, it lacks the thematic cohesion of its predecessor.
The pivotal figure here is the bookish Greg, who has moved on from working at an industrial plant to become an English supply teacher. The problem is that he finds himself torn between two women: his volatile ex, Steph, wants him back – especially when she finds he is enjoying a cosy relationship with her best friend, Carly. Just to complicate matters, Carly’s ex-husband, Kent, is also fiercely jealous of Greg’s involvement with his former wife.
LaBute captures well the quiet egotism of the naturally diffident. Like many an Ayckbourn hero, the non-confrontational Greg causes emotional havoc wherever he goes. The part is exceptionally well played by Tom Burke, who greets every new demand with a baffled charm and a wanly shrugged eyebrow, and whose indecision is final. But not even Burke’s tousled charisma can quite persuade me the two women would expend so much energy on Greg, and his spasmodic friendship with the aggressively physical, book-hating Kent strikes me as wildly improbable. What holds our attention is the smooth fluency of Michael Attenborough’s production, the skill of Soutra Gilmour’s set – in which a container-truck opens up to reveal various interiors – and the quality of the performances.
Lauren O’Neil captures all the explosiveness of Steph, who keeps going off like a Fourth of July rocket, Robyn Addison easily suggests the sensuality lurking inside Carly’s shift-supervisor uniform and Warren Brown conveys Kent’s thuggish insecurity. But with a third play about the characters in the offing, you feel LaBute is edging away from his usual bilious comic antagonism and more in the direction of TV’s Friends.
- At the Hampstead theatre, London, until 16 April. Box office: 020-7722 9301.
