Shopping and F***ing (Sly Rat Theatre Co. & NIDA Indpendent Program) - Review

SHOPPING AND F***ING directed by Alan Chambers - Review I received an invitation for Sly Rat Theatre’s production of Mark Ravenhill’s Shopping and F***ing in my inbox. A quick Google search of the company confirmed my suspicions: a new theatre company of mid-20-somethings, a self-proclaimed political bent, a desire to ‘push’ the limits of independent theatre … the list goes on. Ravenhill’s script, a beacon of subversive theatre, has been the perfect vessel for these kinds of youthful aspirations since its debut in the mid-1990s. It’s got sex, violence, drugs, a vague if perplexing commentary on consumerism and the kind of looping, pseudo-profundity that seems to appeal to young theatre makers intent on carving out a name for themselves. Or perhaps this is the cliché one often applies to independent companies; that the struggle to be ‘different’ or provocative is paramount. Shopping and F***ing inhabits a strange place in contemporary theatre history, remembered for its controversy as much as it’s precision and artistic merit. It’s the kind of work that, along with Terrance McNally’s Corpus Christi, has had its life expectancy almost unnaturally extended by inclusion in tertiary curriculums across the country. So, my expectations were not high before seeing Sly Rat Theatre’s production for the NIDA Independent Program. The risks involved with putting up a show of this nature are threefold: avoiding the pitfalls of a verbatim transfer of 1990s nostalgia, engaging with the play’s philosophical meanderings on face value and focusing on the context-riddled, subcultural ticks of the plot. Chambers and his team of designers boycott the first of these with an intriguing mash-up of punk-Goth costuming and share-house apartment chique. Chambers, pulling a double shift as director/set designer, has stuck together a mountain of cardboard boxes into what might be considered a set. With the help of Stephen Warren’s lights, they morph seamlessly from downright shoddy to a sleazy and quite beautiful wash of neon pink and reds. The effect marks the moments where Chambers’ direction confuses Ravenhill the junky documentarian with Ravenhill the violent poet. This is by no means a criticism. Mixed with a haunting soundtrack by Andy Harmsen, the visual and aural experience of the show gently pushes at both boundaries. Chambers tackles the others by simply pushing them aside. He instead focuses on the comedy in the prose and plays it to the extreme. All the jokes are already in the script and his reading of them poses a, quite possibly, devastating question: have we, for the past decade and a half, dressed a twisted sit-com up as high art? The play is a devious collections of set-ups and let-downs. Mark (Giles Gartrell-Mills) has the unenviable task of protagonist, reeling in the rest of the free-wheeling cast. Gartrell-Mills handles the sexuality of his character with a seamless tenderness that renders what I assume were once stage taboos as commonplace. This reading of Shopping and F***ing pushes the ‘queer’ into the background in a such a surprising way that even the plays gross little trio of gay/bisexual/BDSM etc. ‘bottom-feeders’ (as the director’s notes put it) is hard to even blink an eye at. What Mark allows and what he takes issue with provides the most intriguing fulcrum for the rest of the action to hang off. He is more than the central everyman who awkwardly observes in place of the audience. He is fully ingrained in the niche’ world of the play - both victim and accomplice – in a way that adds to the cruel sense of voyeurism you feel as an audience member. His performance is a tightly controlled piece of work. He is utterly believable when discussing the mechanics of licking another man’s anus as he is about heroin. Katherine Moss and Joseph Appleton are the counter. There hyper-physical performances are truly hilarious. They slip and slide over each other like a barrel of eels. As Mark’s live in lovers (a perplexing love triangle best viewed than described) is so convincing that I was convinced (and slightly nervous) that their off-stage relationship must be something similar. It is a a gross ballet of movement, both picturesque and creepily elegant, that appears completely natural. Steve McCall as drug lord Brian aand David Ryan Kinsman as call-boy Gary don’t quite fit into this grand plan, however. Though both Kinsman and McCall are both strong, they are too disparate from the central trio to serve as anything more than distractions and plot devices. McCall, in particular, seems like he’s walked in off the set of another play. Brian is a typically anachronistic underworld figure, mixing chaotic fits of violence with incongruous moments of tenderness. He is hilarious and a lively addition to the play, but suffers from a lack of stage-time and clarity. Because both Kinsman and McCall both take on their roles with such an engaging precision, this may be a criticism of Ravenhill. I have never understood how Shopping and F***ing can be classed with the likes of Sarah Kane’s Blasted Patrick Marber’s Closer but this is beside the point. Ravenhill throws the word love so casually that it begins to lose any sense of meaning or common ground. This is his point, perhaps, and the source of Chambers greatest coup d'état. There is no posturing in Sly Rat Theatre’s reading of the script. Shopping and F***ing is not a deconstruction of consumerism nor is it a defiant piece of ‘Queer’ theatre. It is farce. It leaves us, like it leaves its characters, with the overwhelming feeling that we have learned something profound. We haven’t and, like Mark and co., have been tricked into thinking otherwise. It is a wonderful double bluff that Chambers has rigged in such an intricate way that it slowly becomes infuriating. Shopping and F***ing is an hilarious play and this production follows it down its rabbit hole of philosophical red herrings to the end. It is gross and unfulfilling but, then again, so is shopping and sex (sometimes). Chambers has clearly thought this through and the comedy is played to the max. While the concept of transaction features heavily in the play, the biggest deal happens between the playwright and the audience: a deal of themes and meanings is struck with both parties whispering ‘sucker’ beneath their breaths. The irony being that we’ve been distracted from the bigger picture, the matrix within the matrix, and convinced there is a deeper truth behind everything. There isn’t. Ravenhill gets that and so does Chambers and his crew. This beautiful sleight of hand comes to us via a tight and committed cast that, unlike their characters, know exactly what’s going on. Four stars. Dean Taylor