Tag Archives: Nick Payne

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“Constellations” at the Vaudeville Theatre

I’ve loved Nick Payne’s play for a long time – since its première upstairs at the Royal Court in 2012. This exceptional two-hander, using the idea of multiverses from theoretical physics, presents diverse possibilities within one relationship. Deservedly a huge hit, Constellations is a must-see that is getting better with age. I wonder in what universe we can start calling it a modern masterpiece?

With this revival of Michael Longhurst’s production, also seen in the West End and on tour, the headline news is that four groups of performers will tackle the fantastic roles. Take your pick from Sheila Atim and Ivanno Jeremiah, Peter Capaldi and Zoë Wanamaker, or Anna Maxwell Martin and Chris O’Dowd. The exciting possibilities reflect the different outcomes within the text – a very smart idea.

A fourth option intrigued me more than the other talented combinations – Omari Douglas and Russell Tovey. Constellations wasn’t written with a gay couple in mind. Would the play or text change? As it happens, tweaks are minimal and the play isn’t altered a jot: it’s just as funny and moving as before. And both performers have taken every advantage of the opportunities within Payne’s script.

It’s not quite fair to say that Tovey supplies the laughs and Omari the tears. The roles point towards this, but both performers embrace the short scenes with different outcomes and swiftly altering emotions that the play features. But Tovey’s comedy skills really are excellent – there are proper belly laughs in the play. And Omari is heart-breaking as Payne develops his theme of mortality with fantastic skill.

The text isn’t just rewarding for performers. If you’re new to it Constellationswill stay with you a long time. Pulling out universals from the multiverses we encounter makes for powerful stuff. Or, appropriately enough, if you have seen the play before, your reactions might change. For me, Longhurst brings home how clear Payne’s text is: for complex ideas about science and free will the exposition is excellent. And maybe it’s my own age, but the play is much more moving than I recall. 

While I remember being moved to tears all those years ago, I cried even more this time around. And I wasn’t alone. A sell-out show with no social distancing, the production received a fantastic reception from the audience. A keenness to talk as soon as the lights come up is, like the show itself, a thrill to experience. Nearly ten years on, there’s still a fantastic buzz about – in my universe anyway – this modern masterpiece.

Until 12 September 2021

www.nimaxtheatres.com

Photo by Marc Brenner

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“Elegy” at the Donmar Warehouse

While (seldom) questioning the subject matter a playwright chooses, some should come with a warning. With its main character suffering a degenerative brain condition, Nick Payne’s new play – brilliantly written as it is – makes for a harrowing experience. Elegy calls forth questions as topical as they are uncomfortable and nothing about this play is easy.

New techniques in nanotechnology and neuroscience are knocking at the door, and Payne explores their potential effect on a mind slipping into dementia. They may prove a miracle that extends life, but let’s not use the word cure. Memory is lost and anyone who’s read David Hume will know the consequences of this. Lorna and Carrie, who married each other late in life, find their romance has been surgically removed in the process of ‘saving’ the former. That the person she was is gone, akin to the effects of dementia anyway, is one cruel irony. Another – her inability to recognise her lover means the treatment has worked – makes matters peculiarly grim.

The play is performed backwards. We meet the women after Lorna’s treatment and retrace the steps leading to her surgery. Becoming increasingly involved with this couple, there’s a cruel twist that brought me to tears. The reverse technique, well served by Josie Rourke’s direction, builds tensions and allows three excellent actors to give mind-boggling performances. Zoë Wanamaker’s struggle with the illness is as frank as it is moving. Barbara Flynn is a revelation as her wife: engaging, appealing and torn apart. They are joined by the superb Nina Sosanya as a doctor who slowly reveals her personal motivations behind her professional mask.

It’s Payne’s superior skill with dialogue that’s the jewel here. Painful conversations feel fresh, characters’ attempts at humour and their struggle to comprehend, believable. Particularly in rendering the incoherence of stumbling, confused and truncated speech, the economy and precision of language is brave and haunting.

Science has long been a theme of Payne’s – putting people into the equation is his skill. Elegy ups the stakes and demands a great deal. At its heart is the complex question of what makes us human, encompassing faith, love, history and our responsibilities to each other. The fear that we’re on the brink of unknown territory is palpable. Away from dystopian fantasy, this play feels real enough to give you nightmares, propelling us into the messy heart of a dilemma with piercing skill.

Until 18 June 2016

www.donmarwarehouse.com

Photo by Johan Persson

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“Constellations” at the Trafalgar Studios

One of the strongest plays written in recent years, Nick Payne’s Constellations continues its huge success with Michael Longhurst’s impeccably directed production finishing a nationwide tour in the West End. If you haven’t already seen the play, then you must go. If you have seen it, you shouldn’t need persuading to go again.

This mind-bending romance, full of laughter and tears, explores theoretical physics and the concept of the multiverse – where every action, or inaction, creates infinite parallel realities. I’m not saying I fully understand the theories, but what use the script makes of this scientific speculation is remarkable – repeating lines in short scenes to show altered situations and outcomes.

Roland and Marianne, whose lives we follow, start or don’t start a love affair, which runs both smoothly and unevenly. The changes in situations are funny – especially at a first meeting or a chance reunion at a ballroom dancing class – an exhilarating mix of intelligent humour and belly laughs. But running through the play is Marianne’s illness, a heart-wrenching memento mori explored with such sensitivity and originality it is inspiring.

Payne’s writing is a gift to an actor. Taking on the roles of the couple who do and don’t get together, do and don’t betray one another, affords brilliant opportunities to show off skills and allows Joe Armstrong and Louise Brealey to shine. Armstrong has instant appeal – his beekeeping character wins your heart. Brealey’s performance has more variety, moving back and forth from gawkish scientist to a somewhat cold, cynical figure. When it comes to her character’s illness, she is magnificent. I remember crying when I first saw Constellations and it happened again as Marianne is forced to communicate via sign language in a brave and brilliant scene.

Constellations is an excellent drama and an hilarious comedy, but just as exciting is the way Payne has made questions of life, love, death and morality central to the theories he explores. This multiverse is far from abstract when it comes to the issue of Marianne’s euthanasia – what those white coats have been working on has implications for us all.

Until 1 August 2015

www.royalcourttheatre.com

Photo by Helen Maybanks

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“Incognito” at the Bush Theatre

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This is it. Nick Payne’s play Incognito, which opened in London last night at the Bush Theatre, is the kind of exciting new play you wait a long time for. Theatrically bold, startlingly intelligent, full of insight and wit, there’s a palpable sense that this is an important piece.

The play interweaves three compelling stories: a man without long-term memory is observed over time by researchers; a scientist steals Einstein’s brain for research in 1955; and a neuropsychologist has a life-changing love affair in the present day. Incognito is an exploration into the science of the mind and the philosophy of the self: the ‘stuff’ that makes us who we are. Intellectually curious and full of big themes, it is also lively and entertaining.

There’s common ground with Payne’s previous award-winning play, Constellations. The different paths lives take sounds a continuous bass note. But Incognito explores fertile philosophical questions more explicitly and engages with science more forcefully. Father figures are used in a thought-provoking manner to examine the contribution heritage and history make to our identity. And, wait, there are great laughs too. As with David Hume, whom I suspect Payne admires, there’s an earthiness that develops into a rich humour. This serious play is also very funny.

For all the jokes, Incognito is a demanding work, but there’s a deserved sense of confidence from the terrific writing. Payne’s ability to form connections between the many characters so quickly is unerring. The switch from pathos to a great gag is like lightning, and having the characters and themes “come together and move away” is as exciting as a thriller. Director Joe Murphy builds a breathtaking rhythm, carrying (and crediting) the audience as the scenes become less naturalistic in casting and speedier in transition. Incognito is wonderfully crafted and hugely exciting.

This is a challenging play for performers and the cast’s achievement will amaze. Four performers share 21 characters, differentiating mostly with accents as the stories move geographically and through the decades. Paul Hickey transforms himself remarkably, Alison O’Donnell and Sargon Yelda show tremendous comic skills and Amelia Lowdel is spectacular in every scene. This is riveting stuff that deals well with powerful emotions and piercing questions. One for the heart and the head, it’ll have your synapses snapping, and will hang around your hippocampus long after you leave the theatre. Five stars. See it.

Until 21 June 2014

www.bushtheatre.co.uk

Photo by Bill Knight

Written 16 May 2014 for The London Magazine

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“The Same Deep Water As Me” at the Donmar Warehouse

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Following the success of Nick Payne’s award-winning Constellations, Josie Rourke, artistic director at the Donmar, has the coup of presenting his new play, The Same Deep Water As Me. Set in a ‘no-win-no-fee’ lawyers’ office in Luton, it’s a departure for the young writer, moving from intimate personal dramas into the wider world of work. Payne tackles big issues with humour and intelligence and deserves great success.

Superbly directed by John Crowley, the play’s plot, an attempt to swindle large companies via insurance claims, serves to explore the theme of lying. The rather desperate Kevin suggests the idea to his old school friend Andrew, who has made good as a lawyer. In a bravura performance, Daniel Mays takes the lead, deceiving his character’s older colleague Barry and renewing an attachment to his first love, now Kevin’s wife, Jennifer (a charming Niky Wardley). Payne’s strong characterisations emerge as they become embroiled in the scam.

There are some marvellous one-liners here, some of the funniest you’ll hear on stage in London at the moment, and the delivery from Marc Wotton’s Mephistophelean Kevin is superb. Nuanced observations on class are used to particularly great effect when a claim is contested in court: Peter Forbes and Monica Dolan play a sleek legal establishment magnificently and Isabella Laughland’s cameo as a lorry driver is arresting (if a shockingly small role for such a talented actress).

Payne’s writing has a strange modesty that makes for a unique voice – a joke denied a punch line, unstated emotions suggested with restraint – and surely many a dramatist would have opted for the more dramatic criminal court instead of a civil one? Playing down has a purpose: raising questions about access to justice is topical but, providing a further satisfying weight, a Kantian universalizability shows that this is deep water we really are all in together.

Until 28 September 2013

www.donmarwarehouse.com

Photo by Johan Persson

Written 12 August 2013 for The London Magazine

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“Constellations” at the Royal Court Theatre

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Constellations, a new play by Nick Payne at the Royal Court, applies the theory that there are multiple universes onto one couple. “Everything you’ve ever and never done” is played out in different ‘multiverses’ creating many stories. In a series of short scenes the relationship on stage is presented in parallel narratives – from friendship to marriage, in sickness and in health, rejection to reconciliation. These multiple realities make Constellations a truly wonderful play.

By turn hilarious, with sharp comic observations, then dealing with tragic events, there’s an ironic eye to this multiverse idea that makes Constellations a playful affair. The decisions any playwright faces when making a drama mirror those we face in life: Payne wants to show all these choices with a virtuoso display that runs his actors and audience through the gamut of possibilities.

Repeated dialogue and stops and starts that occur on entering each new universe are handled skilfully by director Michael Longhurst. And the repetition of lines allows Sally Hawkins and Rafe Spall to give stellar performances as they modulate their delivery of the same conversations in different contexts. Spall’s comic ability and incontrovertible charm are perfect for the likeable character he plays, while the moments of vulnerability show his sensitivity.

Both actors have to turn on a dime, as they switch from universe to universe, and they excel at this. Sally Hawkins is truly remarkable not only at getting laughs, but at exploring the play’s darker moments. Whenever she despairs it is deeply moving, all the more so since only a second before she was making us giggle. Seldom have I laughed and cried in such close proximity.

Constellations marks a development in Payne’s writing not to be missed. It’s an ambitious, confident piece which retains his warm wit yet has a bleak edge. The work is also beautifully poetic – the revisited phrases are not only a comic device, but wrought to create a hypnotic symphony of feelings.

If this sounds pretentious then think again: Payne works in another universe where experimentation like this isn’t pompous. There’s no intellectual posturing here and, while the ideas are a challenge, this is a practical play extolling experience, embracing our condition and offering consolation not with philosophy but physics.

Until 11 February 2012

www.royalcourttheatre.com

Photo by Simon Annand

Written 20 January 2012 for The London Magazine

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“Wanderlust” at the Royal Court

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Nick Payne’s great new play Wanderlust is about love and sex – the absence and surfeit of both, the differences between them, and where the two overlap. The Royal Court has spotted great new writing yet again. This play is very funny and deeply moving.

Tim and his school friend Michelle begin to experiment with sex as a favour (unrequited love for him makes her oblige his anxious curiosity). James Musgrave and Isabella Laughland are instantly believable as the confused teens. The great thing here is that, unlike most 15 year olds on stage these days, they aren’t violent or mentally ill. They are touchingly real as a result. We really hope they don’t develop the same problems as their elders.

Tim’s father Alan is more desperate for sex than his teenage son. Forced abstinence has resulted in a strain that Stuart McQuarrie performs with endearing charm. Even overweight middle-aged men need a sex life (trust me on this) but, given the chance to explore his darker side, he can’t even remember to take his socks off.

Alan’s attachment to hosiery might explain his wife’s lack of interest in the bedroom, but Joy turns out to be aptly named. Dutifully exploring her sexuality to save her marriage results in a transformation Pippa Hayward achieves quite miraculously. From being, “tired, worn out and uptight” she becomes a radiant, sexy woman hoping to start again.

Payne has a refreshing take on the glamour that surrounds sex and youth. We don’t have to put up with kitchen sinks or the fabulously wealthy: his milieu is the middle classes. The humour isn’t gentle and can be painfully embarrassing, but this writing has a great deal of heart. Yet the play avoids sentimentality. While a tear comes easily to the eye, the emotions are complex and engaging. This is a tender tale of socks and sex that is not to be missed.

Until 9 October 2010

www.royalcourttheatre.com

Photo by Sheila Burnett

Written 18 September 2010

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“If There Is I Haven’t Found It Yet” at the Bush Theatre

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Under the directorship of Josie Rourke, The Bush Theatre continues its tradition of strong new writing with Nick Payne’s play, If There Is I Haven’t Found It Yet.

A young girl, neglected by her well-meaning, busy parents, is befriended by her prodigal uncle. In a carefully crafted arc, her adolescence is charted from being bullied at school, through the first pains of love, to her shocking desperation and finally some kind of hope for the future.

The teenager in question is played with spirit by Ailish O’Connor, who perfectly captures these troubled years, switching from frustration to confusion. Even more impressive is her ability to reflect the wild mood swings anyone who knows teenagers will recognise.

For O’Connor’s character has some serious problems. Overweight and bullied at school, she and her parents fail to connect. Finding solace in her uncle proves a mistake, given the baggage he carries himself, and the inevitable meltdown is powerful. While our own perspectives may make some problems seem trivial – the teenage date or over-protective parent, for example – so empathetic is the writing that we accept the intensity of the characters’ feelings.

Which is to ignore, so far, the strongest aspect of Payne’s writing. Not only is it intelligent and humane, it is very, very funny. There are some great one liners, but more amusing still are those toe-curling scenes, such as when father and daughter eat together in their local curry house and it is hard to work out which one is hating it more.

The rest of the cast also revel in the strong script. Pandora Colin plays a mother trying to do her best for her daughter and at the end of her patience with her husband. Michael Begley plays the latter, so consumed by his studies into environmental disaster that he ignores what is going on on his doorstep. Perhaps Begley’s performance is tainted too much by caricature, which gets plenty of laughs but does less justice to the underlying humour Payne excels in. Rafe Spall is the erstwhile uncle, offensive and tactless, but not unintelligent.

Payne benefits from tight direction by Rourke and an ambitious set from Lucy Osborne but it is the maturity of the writing that is most memorable. Here we have an intelligent and entertaining platform for exploring the serious issues of how we live now.

Until 21 November 2009

www.bushtheatre.co.uk

Written 26 October 2009 for The London Magazine