| By
Tim Bearder
Three
actors, no interval and a monochrome set bathed in stark lighting.
We're in for an intense piece of student drama - hold on tight!
The
first scene begins at such a pace all it lacks is the sound of the
starter's pistol. Two American film executives thunder into a round
of self congratulatory butt-kissing as they straddle the biggest
coup of their career.
Initially
it's hard to keep pace but quickly you settle aboard the speeding
train of continuous dialogue and over-egged prostrating. David Mamet's
script lines crisscross over each other with the brazen abandon
of a real life conversation.
While
the actors Heman Ojha and Jamie Rann master their own parts with
absolute finesse the meshing is occasionally pre-empted and at those
moments we get two people in their own heads rather than the same
room.
Celia
Weinstock adds a fine third element to the piece and a welcome relief
from the relentless pounding gush of the first half. She plays the
secretary who sleeps with one of the executives to make him throw
out the blockbuster in favour of a thinking person's film.
This
is where I take objection to the actual substance of the piece.
It appears to be saying that the only way to get a good film made
over a blockbuster is to use unethical means but concludes with
the better film being made and the thinking person's film being
exposed as a bit of a lame duck - so where's the moral? Don't trust
your secretary?
I found
the play overly intense with an ultimately unsatisfactory conclusion
but that's criticism of the script rather than the exceptional standard
of the production team.
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