Chatterbox Theatre Awards 2024

So, another year, another crop of great stuff, and another set of opinions you didn't ask for but are getting anyway.  I am having to be brutal in my selections here as there as so many great things I couldn't shoehorn in.   I have linked to my original thoughts too, where I have already published them.

Best revival of a play

So many great plays, many of them revivals this year, so I am working on the basis that the play needs to be properly old to fit into this category, and there needs to be something different from the original production.  There were many also rans, but the nominees are:

Macbeth:  At the Donmar, with David Tennant and Cush Jumbo, this is a play I usually don't actually like very much, spoiled I think by studying it at school.  I was also suspicious about the use of headphones throughout, expecting that it would be distancing from the action.  In fact, it did the opposite; having the protaganists whisper their soliliquy direct into your ear makes it much more intimate.  And hearing the murder of infants being piped directly into your brain is also very unsettling.  I loved the rest of this production too, particularly the deceptively simple set and colour schemes and the musical choices.

The Importance of Being Earnest: At the NT Lyttleton, this was an OTT production from the very first moment that Ncuti Gatwa appeared on stage in his pink ballgown, right the way through to the ridiculous 'G - A - Y' alphabetical choices being made by Hugh Skinner in the library at the end.  The whole thing was designed to bring our two heroes Jack and Algernon skipping and dancing out of the subtextual closet and into the light, and it succeeded beautifully, making it just a couple of hours of huge fun.  The text was played with a bit, but not enough to cause me any pain, and it was just fun from beginning to end.  I think Oscar would have approved.

Romeo + Juliet: At the Circle in the Square, NYC, this was a lively and sexy production which successfully tapped into a youthful vibe, making the stupid choices these kids make seem a little more understandable.  Although very different, it did remind me of the 1990's Baz Lurhmann's version, which also picked up on the youth of that period.  The set design was fab, particularly the spectacular opening of the stage to reveal the flower meadow as Romeo declares his love, but also the use of the bed/balcony which was lifted up and down at different points during the evening, and also the full use of the theatre  overhead walkways, entrances and exits.  Although the songs written especially for the show were a bit pointless, the musical choices in all other respects were excellent, giving us a backdrop to the action onstage which really worked.  I would have loved to have seen it again but couldn't justify yet another ticket.  

And the winner is:  Macbeth

Best New Play

I'm being a bit flexible in my definitions here too, in that the play may have been performed before, only in recent years.  I have seen so many great plays this year, and almost no duds, so getting this down to just a few nominees was really difficult. 

Slave Play: The right wing press had a field day with the fact that the writer proposed 'Black out' nights for this play,  ie nights for Black audiences only.  I'm for anything that encourages new theatre to widen its audiences, and I can see that this particular play, which looks at the long term effects of colonialism, slavery and racism on culture and relationships in the modern world would hit differently for Black and white audiences.  The play teases out these different effects through the couples on stage having sex and relationship therapy,  all relationships with a racial mix of some kind.  It was shocking and uncomfortable, but that to me is theatre at its best in that it opens up a new way of thinking about something.  So, this one was a huge hit for me.

A Tupperware of Ashes:   At the NT Dorfman, this was a beautifully performed and thoughtful play about ageing, dementia, family, threaded through with the experience of a family with Indian heritage living in the UK, and set within the context of Covid too. The central performance by Meera Syal was delicately perfect, and the mixing of song and poetry along with some magical tricks made this a moving story about a strong woman and her family, none of them quite understanding each other however hard they try.

Death of England: Delroy:  Although this play was first performed at the NT, the performances were largely curtailed due to Covid, and I saw the relaunched and slightly reworked final piece of this trilogy at Soho Place Theatre with Pappa Essiedu as Delroy.  One continuous monologue, with Delroy telling us about how he got arrested and missed the birth of his child, this captures a moment in time of one type of experience of being English.   All of the plays together give us a much wider picture, but this was the one that hit hardest for me.

The Years: At the Almeida, a story of one woman's life told through five actors picking up at five key points.  Each part of the story introduced by a tableau in front of a sheet backdrop which then gets hung around the stage as the history of this woman, Annie,  unfolds.  Again, this has some shocking elements particularly the abortion scene which caught the attention of the press, but the play is cumulatively so much better than any one moment.   An amazing cast too, but I predict that this play has good enough bones to be performed again and again.  

For Black Boys Who Have Considered Suicide When the Hue Gets Too Heavy:  Whereas Slave Play took a more American view of race, this play, alongside Death of England: Delroy, took a look at the Black British experience in particular.  This time I really was in the minority in the audience both in terms of age and race, and that was good to see.  The play starts with the context of a group of young Black men in a group therapy session, but with a mix of prose, poetry, dance, song, it takes us on a moving and powerful journey on what it is to be a young British Black man.  After the play they kept the auditorium open for people to talk about their own experiences or share with others.  This shouldn't be confined to Black audiences or even allies though.  This was a wonderful piece of art that I am so glad I got to see. 

Next to Normal: This play is about 15 years old so I debated where to put it, but thought this was perhaps more accurate as it hasn't been significantly reworked.  A play about a woman with bipolar disorder also dealing with tragedy.  It's a musical, but sensitive and moving too, finding perhaps a more accessible way to cover these topics than with a straight play.  The whole cast are impressive and do a great job with the material.  The songs were not particularly memorable to me, but they absolutely drove the story on.  And the reveal towards the end when you find out what has really being going on was a proper gut-punch for me.  One of the joys and dangers of not reading up on a play before going to see it!

Mnemonic: At the NT Lyttleton, this one was memorable for so many reasons, including some audience participation which I think is brave when in a theatre this size.  I didn't pretend to understand it all, but as it was partly about how our brains work, as well as our collective human experience and memory, I think it is ok that it is one I keep coming back to as I suddenly understand more of the points being made.  One I would love to see again.

And the winner is:  For Black Boys Who....

Best theatre moment

This category is for the stand out moments that define the whole play, or help us understand it in a different way. Spoiler alerts within.

Romeo + Juliet, Circle in the Square:  The pull up kiss

The balcony scene is always one of the most memorable parts of the play, these two lovers with a passionate and reckless desire to be together but being kept apart physically as well as by circumstances.  The choice here was to have Juliet suspended above the stage, just too far away for Romeo to reach, but then he finds a way by a huge leap across the stage, then pull up to steal a kiss.  It's obviously powerful for aesthetic reasons (and feeds the Kit Connor fanbase which is huge) but it visually represents everything that the words are trying to say too in a simple but really effective way which creates a gasp (and sometimes a whoop and applause) from the audience and the energy from that moment surges through the rest of the play.  

The Importance of Being Earnest, NT Lyttleton:  The pink ballgown and grand piano

In the very opening scene of this production, we are given clarity about the sort of play this is going to be, as Ncuti Gatwa appears in a shocking pink ballgown to play at a grand piano, surrounded by the ensemble in black tie and a dance number.  This moment makes us laugh, but also sets out its stall in how this revival is going to be played.  There is to be no strait-laced-ness here, instead we are into full campness whenever it can be got away with.   It also makes it clear this is going to be fun and we are going to be complicit in the events of the next couple of hours.  

Slave Play, Noel Coward Theatre: 'Starbucks'

For this moment to really hit you would have to not know what is coming, but it is still a moment that properly sets out the meta layers that we are going to be dealing with in this play.  At this point at about 20 minutes into the first half, we have watched three dubious sexual scenarios play out in front of us that lean heavily on dodgy racial tropes.  Jim and Kaneisha (Kit Harrington and Olivia Washington) have been a master and slave on a plantation and at this point, as they are having cringy sex on the stage I was wondering why everything seemed so cheesy.  Then 'Jim' shouts 'Starbucks' and it becomes clear that it is his safe word, and the whole premise of the rest of the play becomes laid out in front of us and we learn that these characters are in sexual role plays using offensive racial stereotypes to explore what that means for the couples and their relationships. It makes us all laugh of course, but then we begin to understand that this play is actually about the layers of cultural meaning and stereotypes that we all are dealing with.  Complicated and funny, but also meaningful, and all hanging off the word 'Starbucks'.  I can now never mention that chain without remembering this moment.

And the winner is:  Romeo + Juliet: The pull up kiss