'night, Mother at Old Red Lion Theatre

'night, Mother at Old Red Lion Theatre

01 September, 2011
by: DominicdiNezza

Excellent performances in this powerful exploration of suicide can't hide a rough production says Dominic Di Nezza.

Though Marsha Norman is perhaps now more widely known for numerous Broadway musical books, her multi-award-winning two-hander ‘night, Mother remains a powerful exploration of suicide and wasted lives. What’s really eating Jessie (Sadie Shimmin) is not the marital break-up and occasional fits, but a burgeoning despair at missed opportunities and loss of control. Her mother (Pat Starr) is naturally perturbed when Jessie calmly announces that a bullet to the head will round off their quiet evening of hot chocolate and manicures. 

Shimmin is terrific, nailing perfectly the upbeat misery of a woman who has spent her life watching her modest dreams being slowly crushed. Starr’s Mama is, if anything, a little too sparky – she lacks the feigned fragility and country girl simplicity that you sense would keep her daughter close to home, although the crumbling of her dominance in the latter stages is highly compelling. Indeed, this is symptomatic of a curious lack of focus in many aspects of Paul Stacey’s production. Over-choreographed action, hesitant cues and uneven pacing give a feeling of roughness, even under-rehearsal, to a play which ought to be devastating in its simplicity. As with Mama’s signature hot chocolate, all the right ingredients can’t mask a end-product that’s, sadly, a little curdled.


'night, Mother runs at Old Red Lion Theatre until 24th September. 

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