★★★✰✰
Friendship, power, sexuality. Who can deny that these were heavy components to year 10? Sophie Swithinbank’s Bacon explores these topics through the unexpected friendship of Mark (Corey Montague-Sholay) and Darren (William Robinson). Fitting in with Riverside Studios’ Bitesize Festival, Bacon packs a bombastic, intense story into a mere hour.
Awkward middle-class Mark finds himself in the middle of an objectively worse school. Darren, a mouthy but troubled boy, takes pleasure in antagonising him. Their home lives couldn’t be more different but through a mix of making do and glimpses of genuinely enjoying each other’s company, a fragile friendship forms. But as they spiral into declines in mental health and parental abuse, their dynamic becomes increasingly dangerous and traumatic.
We switch back and forth between year 10 and four years later, when Darren meets Mark at work having finished his sentence at juvenile prison. As the play unfolds, we see the power play that precedes this reunion. Swithinbank takes us back to the intoxicatingly teenage feeling of having another person accept you. We know that Darren did something to Mark, but will Mark forgive him and give him five minutes?
The statement prop in Natalie Johnson’s minimal set is a brutalist-looking seesaw. Other than school uniforms and an apron, the seesaw is the only object that informs the dialogue. Swaying up and down, the power struggle between Mark and Darren is obvious. Even when Montague-Sholay’s goofy awkwardness makes us roar with laughter or Robinson shows some vulnerability between pelvic thrusts, we are always aware of who has the upper hand over the other. In Mark and Darren’s most intimate moments, the seesaw is an even bench where their respective weights are equally supported.
Trauma holds a captivating but messy presence in this play. Darren’s turbulent home life is immediately apparent with a violent father and poverty rearing its famished head every lunchtime. While Williams portrays a cheeky wild card that elicited a familiar nervous laughter in both Mark and myself, his woeful context can only carry him so far. We extend our understanding to Darren for his moodiness, his apprehension around sex and experimentation, and even physical altercations. Robsinon brings a painfully childlike vulnerability to the role, tinting his most violent acts with confusion. Regardless, Darren’s sinister final assault becomes a questionable decision as his situation ceases to explain or justify his actions. It’s a shame that our empathy with a troubled kid is unnecessarily dashed by an assault too extreme to wave away with adolescent confusion.
The trickiness of trauma on stage is the most obvious with Mark. Victimised but still infatuated with Darren, the injustice of it all is palpable. The wrong person gets the fresh start, the wrong person gets another chance. Darren built Mark’s prison in his head. Unfortunately, the abundance of trauma on Mark’s end falls flat as suicide and self-harm are thrown into the mix. As Mark’s priority is whether to give Darren those five minutes, his self-destructive impulses and his strained behaviour with his mother fall by the wayside and end up feeling half-baked. Mark’s ultimate arc is learning to break the cycle of falling under the wing of his only friend.
In Bacon, Swithinbank takes us through the rollercoaster of adolescence and leaves us with questions about trauma and forgiveness. Montague-Sholay and Robinson give us an electric friendship that constantly has us unsure of what would happen next. Throughout their highs and lows, their palpable chemistry has us on the edge of our seat.
Bacon will be performed at Riverside Studios until 29 July, before transferring to Edinburgh Fringe from 2-27 August and Bristol Old Vic from 12-16 September.
Words by Elizabeth Sorrell
Support The Indiependent
We’re trying to raise £200 a month to help cover our operational costs. This includes our ‘Writer of the Month’ awards, where we recognise the amazing work produced by our contributor team. If you’ve enjoyed reading our site, we’d really appreciate it if you could donate to The Indiependent. Whether you can give £1 or £10, you’d be making a huge difference to our small team.