A Miracle TNT ***
Molly Davies’ Norfolk-based play, the second in the Royal Court’s New Writers Festival, doesn’t have the sassy polish or assurance of Shades which kicked off the 2009 season, and, at a mere 75 minutes long, barely qualifies as a full-length play. But there’s no doubting the sincerity of this intense, well-acted drama, which explores dreams turned sour and lives – old and young – full of disappointment.
It focuses mainly on two teenagers who, at just 19, already find themselves in places they really don’t want to be – Amy a reluctant single mum working in a chicken nugget factory and with no concept of the needs of her year-old baby, and old school friend turned soldier Gary, back on two weeks' sick leave and fantasising about a different future. But Davies doesn’t ignore the unwelcome changes forced on older generations. Amy’s protective gran, in her 60s and saddled with the care of the unwanted infant, unintentionally thwarts any chance of a lasting bond growing between mother and child, and the recent loss of his pig farm has driven Gary’s dad to the verge of suicide.
The smell of earth hits you as you enter the auditorium, and a sense of empty flatness, sucking the life and ambition from its inhabitants, prevails. A kids’ roundabout provides the only touch of fading brightness in a design which incorporates a kitchen, a bedsit and farmyard bags of animal bedding.
Grass sprouts sparsely, but like the squashed hopes of all Davies’ characters, it seems to be fighting a hopeless battle in the bleak, rural wasteland she portrays.
Royal Court Theatre, Sloane Square, SW1 (020 7565 5000). Until March 21. £10-£15
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