BREAD AND ROSES (Greenwich Theatre)****

 

By Cal

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrZGQhYJmfo

Available until: Unknown

I love Zoom plays. I really do and I’ve seen a lot of really great ones, including from Greenwich Theatre, which are so good, that the fact the actors are on different screens and could be thousands of miles apart doesn’t matter. There are also a lot of new plays which have been written for Zoom performances.

But to see a play like this, where the actors are not only in the same location but able to touch, that’s not something you get to see very much in current plays. In this play, we do get to see it and it’s really great. I’m lucky enough not to be starved of hugs, but physical affection in online plays is something that usually can’t happen. So it means that little bit more when it is allowed to happen.

This play is about Lily (Alice De-Warrenne) and May (Jessica Aquilina), who live together. (Presumably, unless this is an older film than I thought it was, the actors do too.) Lily’s relationship has ended messily. May tries to help.

It’s a really simple idea, but one which a lot of people can relate to. Even people who have never experienced this have probably had times when they’ve worried about it. Deborah Whitmarsh-Boyse wrote this in response to the prompt ‘Memories’ and she writes both girls very sympathetically. Lily is suffering. May is probably one of the kindest girls in fiction. It’s good to see kindness celebrated. It doesn’t happen enough.

Their conversation, as you might expect, includes the sharing of memories from Lily’s relationship with John. Deborah has chosen the memories really cleverly – they not only tell you about John, they say a lot about Lily and May too. Director James Haddrell starts off by switching the shots between Lily and May – Lily on the floor with her phone and alcohol and May trying to get on with things. It’s interesting that Lily, at this very low point, is physically as low as she can be without actually lying on the floor. Lily is stuck in one place mentally so she can’t move from the floor. When May realises she has to stop and be with Lily, she puts herself at Lily’s level, sitting beside her. Maybe I’m imagining it, but I think the levels do mean something.

Alice and Jessica both give great performances. Alice shows her ability to play emotion as Lily. May doesn’t have that much to say about herself as her focus is Lily, but Jessica puts so much into May’s personality, she made me feel really interested in her as a character.

This play shows just how much can be done with one room, a one-word prompt and one simple idea. Sometimes you don’t need technology or action or a complicated plot with twists and turns. Sometimes all you need are two characters.