Omnibus theatre, London
Nick Danan is captivating as a power-hungry, parasitic theatre critic drawn into a supernatural world
This lesser revived monologue by Conor McPherson begins with male mid-life crisis but heads into a direction that is altogether more unfamiliar and alluring. A man sits before us, telling his story with the intimacy of a confession. He is a Dublin-based theatre critic, played by Nick Danan, jaded and power hungry, though not quite as flatly villainous as Ian McKellen’s drama reviewer in Patrick Marber’s The Critic. He speaks of his drinking, his distance from his family and his search for a story that will elevate him into the ranks of the artists he so envies.
For a while, it seems as if this is little more than an acid-tipped screed against journalists. But McPherson’s monologue warms up when it enters into supernatural territory. The atmosphere is that of a ghost story but with a cast of enigmatic vampires who do not kill humans but feed off them nightly – rather like a theatre critic might be seen to do. The narrator is enlisted to bring back victims for them, and endowed with the charm to reel them in.
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