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Still here: While They Were Waiting - Upstairs At The Gatehouse

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As the song goes, time heals everything. Or as another song says, it's time after time. Yet waiting—for a moment, a minute, or even a while—can feel like a chore. In Gary Wilmot’s slightly absurd and silly While They Were Waiting, the focus is on waiting and wordplay. No opportunity is missed to find more than one meaning in what is said. A debate arises about the difference between a smidge and a whisker. There's a playful riff on how you can be here and over there at the same time, depending on your standpoint. If this piece has a point at all, it depends on what you find funny. The concept of waiting-related language is, in itself, amusing, and there is plenty to laugh about in this show. It’s currently playing at Upstairs at the Gatehouse . The premise is simple: Mulbery (Steve Furst) arrives for an appointment and is kept waiting. What the appointment is for, we are not clear about but he is waiting for a yellow door to open. Nobody answers when he rings. He’s joined by th...

Man Overboard: The Light House @ParkTheatre


Lightness and dark are in the balance in The Light House, writer and performer Alys Williams's story about the complexity of love. It is a love story about the highs and the lows of falling in love with someone who doesn't always want to be alive. But with some deft storytelling and some inspired audience participation, the piece is an uplifting and funny tale about the joys and otherwise of being in love. After a tour of the UK, it is having its London premiere at Park Theatre as part of their Make Mine a Double season of short plays.


From the outset, Williams sets the piece's tone by calling for audience involvement to help shout "Man overboard" or blow whistles. She is a reassuring navigator, so while every show differs depending on who agrees to participate, you get the sense that you're in safe hands with her.

And that becomes the story here as well. After falling in love with a fellow acting student, how does she find a way to keep the lights on, deal with emergency rooms and long distances and live together? There may be rules and procedures for various things, but what can you do when someone you love doesn't want to be alive? A safe pair of hands is perhaps a start. 

It's a sensitively told story enhanced by an uplifting soundtrack including "Singing in the Rain" and Leonard Cohen's "Dance Me to the End of Love". If songs are the soundtracks to our lives these serve to remind us of the how much there is to life.  

Directed by Andrea Heaton, The Light House is at Park Theatre until 13 April.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️


Photos: Ant Robling




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