Four Minutes Twelve Seconds

By rights I shouldn't have liked this much. A debut play, cheap, no well-known cast members, hardly any set and above all somewhat trendy subject matter - sexting amongst the young.

But instead I thought it was a truly wonderful piece of work. Hell, it IS a wonderful piece of work. Why?

Well unlike almost any play I have seen, all the dialogue was totally believable. Unlike say the vastly inferior, but much vaunted Charles III, where the plot and characters just don't make sense so you have to just brush over all the non sequiturs, in this one every thing seems entirely logical. You can see why each character would react in exactly the way they did, More importantly, as more and more of what has happened, the big reveals all seem uncontrived. It doesn't all feel like a massive theatrical device, although clearly that is exactly what it is. And it is a very clever play. Not least as it manages to go through the entire story without the subject, Jack, appearing at any time.

the play opens with mum exclaiming that there is blood on her 17 year old son's shirt. Dad explains it away as a nose-bleed, but on more questioning by mum, it transpires the boy had been attacked. As the scenes develop, we learn that the reason for the attack by his ex-girlfriend's brother was that a clip showing him having rough sex with the girl had found its way onto the internet.

At first this is all a play about mother wanting to protect son from the lies and violence of the family of the local hardcases, but through only dialogue between the parents, plus meetings with the boy's amiable but none too brought best mate (suspected of uploading said video) and the girlfriend (suspected of making up stories that he forced her to have sex), it becomes clear that we are indeed dealing with a case of rape. But what do you do when its your only son that has perpetrated this, not just some nasty piece of work you read about in the paper?

None of the answers given are obvious, but they are understandable, believable. Mother goes from protective to wanting to shop him to the police, and then back again. She just can't do it.

Kate Maravan as the mother acts her socks off and is far better than the rest of the cast. But this really deserves to be worked up before a much bigger audience. And it was so nice to go to a play that doesn't preach at you. A similar play could easily have been angled at how the middle-class boy is finally brought down by realising the awful harm he has done to naive young working glass girl and how she gains her revenge. But this was a beautifully balanced piece.

You can tell I liked it can't you?