Showing between Wednesday 1st and Sunday 5th July 2009 @ Tobacco Factory Theatre, Bristol

Out Of Touch is a new trilogy of short plays by one of Bristol’s newest playwrights, Adam Peck; three twenty minute stories, each exploring a relationship between a man and a woman, covering themes of love, memory, life and death. Although there are thematic winks back and forth between the three plays with echoes in the plot and script, ultimately, each is viewed and judged by the audience as a separate entity.

The standout show for me was the middle act, Magpie, an abstract examination of a middle-aged marriage where the love has been lost. The sharp script, choreography, acting, live music, lighting and emotional journey was spot-on throughout in the creation of a fantastic mini-performance that swung from truly heartfelt to laugh-out-loud funny. Saskia Portway shone as the middle-aged wife, struggling with whether she should leave her husband or not, beautifully portraying a woman that wants to be confident and happy but feels completely lost in her life and is getting more and more desperate. She was complimented opposite wonderfully by Chris Bianchi, a bullish, ogre of a husband when he needed to be but is equally as lost in his quest for love. The cut-and-paste nature of the script means Magpie could only ever really work as a theatre piece and FairGround utilised this perfectly in the creation of some fantastically absorbing theatre.

Magpie, however, was everything the first act show, Tide, wasn’t. The story follows a chance meeting of two troubles teenagers on a bench by the sea but the performances and direction was flat and alienating and the play couldn’t seem to come to terms with its own dark undertones.

Thankfully proceedings picked up again wonderfully for the final act of the trilogy, Where You Can’t Follow; a surreal story about a man trapped in a time-loop who swings back and forth from being happily married with children to the night he met his wife to be. It’s a very surreal script that confuses the audience and itself at times but is essentially very interesting; however, I do think the story could still be taken further as the audience know nothing more about what’s really going on after 2 minutes than we do after 30.

Where You Can’t Follow was performed charmingly by the engaging and funny duo of Adam Peck and Cathy McKinnon and would probably have left much more of an impression on me if I hadn’t been so completely blown away moments before by Magpie. I think I might go again just to see that middle act!

www.fairgroundtheatre.co.uk

www.tobaccofactorytheatre.com

Matthew Whittle www.matthewwhittleblog.blogspot.com
Photos by Farrows Creative