Lion and Unicorn Theatre, London
**
Black and white
staging leaves no room for grey areas in Matt Reed’s Impotent! According to Reed ‘Impotence is big
business right now.’ As a female, perhaps I’m not best placed to assume the feelings
that impotence can cause; judging by my Junk E-mail folder, Reed is correct
about it being a big business. If you’re watching the production in the hope
that it can give you any insight into the psychology behind impotence, you
might be sorely disappointed.
With Helena
Blackman as the fairly two dimensional Dr Lane (a psychologist, specialising in
the treatment of impotent men) and a cast of chaps prepared to bare all
(thankfully not literally!) the show gets underway with a fairly promising
start.
Don Cotter, as
the naive Keith, puts in a solid performance that any audience can empathise
with. A man whose wife left him for his ‘flashy’ brother in law who presumably
doesn’t wear anoraks, Keith’s problem is low self esteem. It’s perhaps not
unusual when Keith reveals that his job as the ‘Weetabix Crumb Sweeper’ at the
Weetabix factory is safe, because unlike the machine that could do it so fast
that it ‘blew up’, they haven’t got to worry about Keith because he’s ‘never
going to go fast enough for that to happen!’ Dr Lane’s smug smiles and
revelations to her friend that she works with a ‘bunch of dysfunctional men’
show that perhaps she’s not as sympathetic as she could be about Keith’s
psychological problems.
 |
| Photo: Nadia Shash |
Indeed the
unsympathetic doctor has a motley crew of patients; the un-flashy Keith;
attractive but arrogant (and impotent) Saul; stereotypical public school boy
Gareth; camp Joseph and quite frankly, rude Gordon. All show that impotence can
affect everyone. Yes that’s correct, even Gordon (Neil Stewart) with his
Cambridge education, ability to talk over everyone about Politics and
irritating habit of calling Dr Lane, ‘Zoe’. I’m amazed that he was able to
discover that he was impotent, but as his experience with Anya, a Russian
prostitute (played spectacularly by Jessie May) shows, he has ‘about as much
impact as your 1990 bomb’. Similar in fact to the play itself.
This is
unfortunate, because as Reed writes in the programme, "if you can’t get humour
or poignancy from that subject matter [impotence] you should have your quill
and parchment confiscated." Awkward, although perhaps not as awkward as Saul’s
declaration of love for Dr Lane. Transference is something that counsellors and
psychologists are trained to deal with in a professional manner, however Dr
Lane’s screaming fit and expletives are perhaps not strictly textbook.
There are
although, brief, light-hearted moments. Doctor’s assistant Kelly (Rebecca
Crookshank) and boyfriend Tommy (Randall Lyon) bring moments of hilarity into
the group ‘meditation’ session. Tommy’s hypothesis that the men are just “afraid
of minge” and that they should just get over it, is welcome, and Kelly’s big
heels, big hair and backchat are flashes of colour in an otherwise drab
setting.
With moments of
tenderness that are marred by unnecessary quips and a lack of sensitivity on
the subject matter, Impotent!
can be an uncomfortable but
straightforward viewing. As Saul eloquently puts it, “all of our problems are
entirely self taught”. Well, if I ever come across a man who is unfortunate
enough to experience impotence, I’m going to refer him to my Junk Mail folder.
After all, they seem pretty sympathetic and certainly less of a drain on the
taxpayer than the NHS approach.
This production runs until 26 January 2013.
For more information: http://www.giantolive.com/impotent.html
@GiantOlive @MOPTheatreCo
1 comment:
You briefly mention some "lack of sensitivity of the subject matter" but this is hardly enough to warrant two stars. Overall your review doesn't really give much criticism at all. Could you better clarify what in your opinion was particularly poor about the show?
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