Review by Sam Waite
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It’s a universally recognised fact that the more a person says, “I’m fine,” the less fine that person is. This is particularly true for Charly, the central and titular character of Lady Dealer, an Edinburgh Fringe hit now running at London’s Bush Theatre. Created by Martha Watson Allpress, Charly is perhaps more the manifestation of breaking down than she is a human being, and the glimpse into a day in her life is utterly captivating.
Charly talks her audience through a fairly typical morning – today, she assures us… but mostly herself, is going to be the same. Yesterday was what it was, and today will be more of what it is… except that it won’t. Drug dealer Charly has thrown herself fully into her “ethical-ish business” in order to distract from a recent breakup, but both of her phones have died and her estate has been hit by a power cut. As the day continues, we see Carly’s acerbic wit and playful personality give way to pain, and a realisation that the same is getting harder to hold onto.
Part of what makes Lady Dealer such an arresting show is how well-formed and familiar the character is – a well-educated but thoroughly working-class young woman who is both aware of and open about the myriad of coping mechanisms making up her daily habits. A particularly strong moment finds her marching home from a trip to McDonald’s, burning quickly through topics including performative feminism versus actual, politically-driven feminism, and the very fact that she’s keeping an ongoing monologue in order to not actually take in the world around her. What’s fascinating about her is that she’s so intelligent, her rambled points being arguably correct and inarguably well-put, but has only demonstrated this intellect to fill the overbearing silence.
Emily Aboud’s direction keeps this sense of urgency and the need for activity in mind at all times, keeping the character in near-constant motion unless actively stopping to demonstrate something or to really focus on a topic. There’s an understanding, in both the writing and the direction, that a collapse into anguish isn’t always immediate and isn’t always one-note – Charly’s emotional arc is defined by the ups and downs of her day, wherein she can be utterly delighted one second and entirely devastated the next. The moments of purest upset are the moments where Aboud will cease the motion for just long enough, letting Charly and the audience sit with just how overwhelming the emotion is.
Scenic artist Gemma Bacha and designer Jasmine Araujo, working from concepts by Blythe Brett, create a surprisingly adaptable stage with three large speakers, all with a myriad of plugs and cables attached. These bring a sense of realism to the extreme volume at which the Beastie Boys are blared before the power cuts out, and are used effectively to represent other furnishings and locations. The audience is silently asked to go along with whatever things are implied to be, and it’s generally easy to follow – she wakes up atop a speaker, therefore the bed, she sits to drink her coffee on the same one, now the sofa, and sits to scroll on her phone on the grille of another, her toilet. There spacing also allows her frantic pacing around the intimate studio space to pass for a determined march through a tightly-packed estate, or across the laundry-strewn floors of her cluttered flat.
Accompanied almost exclusively by voiceover performances, Alexa Davies is genius in her performance as Charly, bringing a real weight to the emotions and a nuanced understanding to the character as a whole. Watching her, listening to her speak, I felt like I knew Charly intimately – indeed, I’ve met people just like Charly, the same seemingly unused intellect, the same tendency towards the seemingly seedier parts of life, the same lack of apology for how socially “wrong” her life may be. What makes the sometimes-poetic monologues so easy to follow the journeys of is just how human the performance is, there being such an authenticity to both the joy and the sorrow as Davies portrays them. Striking just the right balance of over-the-top, almost show-offy bravado and richly felt, subtly expressed feelings, Davies gives a pitch-perfect, strikingly real performance.
If not for the grateful bows at the end of the well-paced 75 minutes, you could be forgiven for assuming that this was an autobiographical piece, and that Alexa Davies was simply reliving her own traumas before our eyes. But this is the result of pure craft, a real understanding of the character from its triumphant trio of star, writer and director – what these three women have created is breath-taking, and deeply affecting. I found myself holding my breath in the final moments, so genuinely worried for a person who I knew wasn’t real, and who I knew would take another group of people through the realisation that saying, “I’m fine,” does not make it true.
With too-bright morning light fading gradually into Charly’s lonely evening, and a pivotal moment making use of a hidden factor of Araujo’s set to bring a literal and symbolic beam of light into the flat, Bethany Gupwell does subtle but essential work. Meanwhile, Anna Short’s sound design shows an understanding of just how strong a silence can be – where the voiceovers are kept in perfect balance, neither too loud to be a real conversation nor too quiet to potentially be drowned out by a fellow viewer’s timing of a gulp or rustling, those silences are where the real power of the show comes to life.
Bolstered by the gifts of its largely-female team, Lady Dealer is a surprising and arresting piece of theatre, both fully realised and open to interpretation in its final moments. With Alexa Davies giving a performance sure to be remembered for years to come, Charly’s story is intoxicating, extraordinarily told, and disarming in just how powerful it proves to be. Following its fringe success and this limited run in the Bush Studio, it would be surprising if this production didn’t have an exciting future ahead.
Lady Dealer runs at the Bush Theatre until June 15th
For tickets and information visit https://www.bushtheatre.co.uk/event/lady-dealer/
Photos by Harry Elletson
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