John Patrick Shanley “Savage in Limbo” at the Lantern Theatre, Brighton

Photos Christina Jansen 

October 13th 2024

A Bronx bar. Five former schoolmates, all 32, are living lives of loud desperation.  Being quiet hasn’t worked. But maybe sated with decibels and wisecracks something gets through. Think The Iceman Cometh meets Mamet hijacked by refugees from The House of Bernarda Alba. O’Neill’s Harry Hope’s bar is mainly haunted by women.  John Patrick Shanley’s 1984Savage in Limbo comes to the Lantern Theatre in a split run ending on October 20^th.

Co-directed by Caroline Farrington and Sebastien Blanc, their company A Pocket of Light Theatre arrives in association with drama school The Actor’s Craft. It’s an initiative drawing experienced actors (one has an Emmy, all sport impressive track records) electing to train further with the Meisner technique.

Born to Irish parents in the Bronx in 1950 (indeed the day I saw it fell on his 74^th birthday, October 13^th) Shanley’s best known for his original 1988 screenplay Moonstruck, (the first of ten) and his Pulitzer and multiple Tony-Award winning Doubt: A Parable of 2005. His third play Savage in Limbohad a rehearsed reading 40 years ago; his latest, Brooklyn Laundry, is now running.

Slumped in the ‘Scales’ bar April White (Lamb Bennett, slowly rising to a tremulous pitch later) needs to drink not to see demons, but they pursue her. Barman Murk (subdued, taciturn but tender Anthony Faure) takes a far more than cursory care of April, in a solidly realised set consisting of a dark-wood bar with stool, tables and a black and white check-tiled floor. All else is a sooty black. A clock stands at 20 past three forever. Though it’s 7.30 there and here. Murk waters his dead plants.

Near-silence is broken by the eponymous Denise Savage (Virginia Thorn), a loud pilgrim who somehow stimulates, irritates or otherwise excites others whilst remaining to her chagrin unchanged. She swiftly proclaims to her former school peers she’s still a virgin, living with her mother. Is she condemned to be a catalyst, transforming others whilst remaining horribly pristine after all the shouting? Yet it was April who declared she’d be a nun. Shanley’s singled out Denise (Savage) as carrying the title, the burden as it were: but there’s no single lead here.

Thorn invests Denise’s acetylene language with a jittery need to connect. She can’t settle. When not talking she tries playing Patience with a set of cards.

Shanley’s writing occasionally threatens Denise monologues, but he keeps destabilising one monologue by introducing another.

This is first through the arrival of Linda Rotunda (Sangeeta Sharma, who will be replaced by Christina Demnezi on the run from 17-20^th). She bemoans her pretty boyfriend proclaims his right to “sleep with ugly women”. And everyone seems to fall for him. Initial friction gives way to dreams against loneliness.

There’s a heart-stopping moment where Murk dons Father Christmas gear to offer April a present. Erin Burbridge’s lighting shifts to violet to envelope the moment’s precious fragility.

Very soon Denise tries recruiting Linda, and more reluctantly April in a flat-share, away from mothers, boyfriends and the shadow which afflicts April above all. Denise’s initial dismissal of April rebounds as Linda and indeed Murk two protect her. The dynamic shifts again as Tony Aronica (a Fonz-fondue realised with panache by Keaton Makki) explodes in his cute unreconstructed manner, proclaiming his rights as Makki smooths himself on a short fuse.

This pivots the action away from flat-share to boy-share. Denise wants to relieve herself of her long-preserved virginity (originally for a special occasion, it hardens into all she’s got) and the dynamics shift again. Denise’s gambits recall Mamet’s Speed-the-Plow in playing a radical (and self-interested) proposal against the status quo. That play wasn’t premiered till 1988.  Shanley and Mamet share a snappy idiomatic dialogue; the Bronx to Mamet’s Chicago. If Mamet palpably influences Shanley, it’s quite possible Mamet repaid the compliment.

Shanley grimly decides that even April is charmed, as well as Linda. Sexist as this seems, it registers the sexual dynamics that still disrupts friendships.

Bennett moves shudderingly centre-stage for her toppling monologue, a tour-de-force of someone who has gone over the edge but needs love and tenderness more than a spell in Bellvue. After this the dynamics paly out, as refusals are twisted, bargains made. Five into four won’t go though, and someone might be left out. Five lonely people you can lose yourself in, but couples invite couples.

A first-class revival. Striking, flawless  performances, tight directing over 75 minutes; idiomatic voice-coaching (one cast-member is a New Yorker) a superb touring set making good integrated use of the Lantern’s black, where Erin Burbridge’s technical lighting and sound are seamless too. A must-see for Brighton audiences.

 
Co-Directed by Caroline Farrington and Sebastien Blanc, Lighting and Tech by Erin B Burbridge.