Shropshire stalwarts Pentabus Theatre have commissioned a rising talent in Tim Price, who has written an acute little three-hander about loss, love and loneliness in the comfortable market town of Ludlow. Its premiere at Hampstead Theatre’s studio confirms how much this Downstairs space has become a real hothouse for promising new work under artistic director Edward Hall.
Geraldine Alexander and Patrick Driver are April and Gordon, an amiable well-to-do country couple trying desperately hard to comfort their teenage son Sid (Jonathan Smith) who has been left partially sighted by the car crash that killed his three best friends.
It’s a heavy and in some ways obvious family scenario: inarticulate and resentful son; tender, fussing mum; dad who would have absented himself by now, had guilt and tenderness not drawn him back into the well-ironed life that doesn’t quite fit any more. But the stereotypes, on closer inspection, take on a keenly detailed life: this, and the humour and tenderness in Price’s play and Pentabus’s excellent production lift ‘For Once’ out of the ordinary.
An immature writer might have wallowed more in the tragedy of the three dead boys: here, their loss is a dark undercurrent which shows the inevitable compromises and disappointments –and the miraculous enduring existence of love – in sharp relief.
Director Orla O’Loughlin lets the insightful actors make their mark in an oblique, persuasive production. She underscores the family’s isolation by having three of them deliver all their dialogue to the front, as if they’re engaged in three separate monologues even when they’re enacting a shared conversation. Wry, compassionate and thought-provoking.