Selected from plays developed at the National Theatre as part of the 2006 and 2007 New Connections seasons, these three short, well-acted works (each around an hour long) were written specifically for young people to perform.
The 2005 season yielded a couple of gems (along with some knockout performances) and although this current selection doesn't have quite the same emotional punch, there's still much to enjoy, admire and commiserate with. In ‘Baby Girl’, quick fire dialogue infuses welcome humour into the fate of 13 year old Kelle (Candassaie Liburd) who, taunted for still being a virgin, encouraged the fumblings of an unpopular but kindly peer with foreseeable consequences. Petra Letang (as her feisty mother, destined to become a grandma at 26) is helpless to stop history repeating itself, and Paul Miller's snappy direction matches the honesty of Roy Williams' street-smart writing.
Dennis Kelly's ‘DNA’ is a disturbing portrayal of bullying gone disastrously wrong. He paints a lurid picture of kids out of control and unable to distinguish between a bit of a fun and sadistic
persecution. Most unsettlingly, it's Sam Crane's taciturn outsider who chillingly illustrates that still waters can run murderously deep, whilst Ruby Bentall adds comic quirkiness as his garrulous friend who talks more than enough for both of them.
A softer note is sounded in Lin Coghlan's ‘The Miracle’ in which adolescent Ron (Ruby Bentall again) seems to have acquired special powers when a flood washes a statue of St. Anthony up through the floorboards. But, even here, there's a disturbed young soldier back from Iraq and once again the teenage years are shown as a difficult and problematic time which, (whilst providing fertile dramatic ground) most adults will be glad to have left behind.
Cottesloe Theatre
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