Review: Strategic Love Play (Soho Theatre)

Review by Harry Bower

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Newsflash! Dating is absolutely horrible. For the vast majority, at least. The never ending swiping on profiles, judging solely on looks and exhaustingly cliche one-liners might, if you’re lucky, lead to a first date in person. But then what? Miriam Battye’s strikingly simple and devastatingly funny Strategic Love Play provides its own answer to that question. What if it was all just…easy?

As the lights go up Man and Woman, as the characters are called, are sat engaging in the world’s most vanilla small talk. Him, going out of his way to be as nice and inoffensive as possible, Her going out of her way to be as honest as she can. In many ways these two are at different ends of the dating spectrum. He hides his immediate judgement and disdain for the online dating world behind a thin, awkward smile and misguided optimism. She is far past the point of no return, so much wrapped up in her own sense of loneliness, shame and hurt after so many unsuccessful encounters that she denies herself any semblance of hope.

With just two actors on stage one could be forgiven for questioning the attention span of an audience sat watching a back and forth relationship drama for seventy minutes. Instead, we are transfixed by an ingenious investigation of modern dating, mental health, lust, and love. 

As the two protagonists hurl inappropriate anecdotes at one another, probing and jibing with wit and hilarity, it’s not hard to find the whole thing uncomfortably relatable. Battye has written something which feels unique and ‘live’, yet familiar - not an easy feat. The two performers are exceptional, and enliven the dialogue with their chemistry and a tension on-stage which is palpable. Archie Backhouse as affable Him is relentlessly believable and endears himself to the audience in his first bumbling, apprehensive interaction. Toying with a sense of masculine vulnerability, Backhouse plays his character as the perfect ‘nice guy’ stuck without an exit plan. Thankfully the backstory introduced in the latter part of the play allows the performer to dig deep and give us an introspection which is both touching and tragic in equal measure.

Letty Thomas as ‘Her’ is a firecracker of infectious energy. Her performance is one of tight emotional restraint, letting her character’s deepest insecurities out at just the right time and then reigning them in again at the drop of a hat. This emotional seesaw is executed perfectly - Thomas makes it easy to see why her character is so intoxicating to her would-be partner. She has perfect comic timing, a wicked grin, and an appropriate sense of unpredictability.

Leaving the theatre, I had a thought about watching Strategic Love Play with a date or significant other. As the chess moves of a strategically planned end-game relationship are explored on-stage, the piece cleverly invites you to consider your own dating persona, and ask yourself challenging questions. How much of ourselves do we hide from others? How quickly do our judgements take over? What do we actually want from a relationship? Wouldn’t it all just be easier if we didn’t have to worry about rejection?

There are so many threads layered throughout this perfectly-paced and snappily directed encounter that it feels just as overwhelming as it might do putting on a brave face and getting ready to meet your next Hinge date. The world of online dating changes so frequently, and with it changes our reactions and perceptions. But it also slowly erodes our sense of hope that we might some day find what we want. We just need to hope that we’re ready for it, when we do.

Strategic Love Play plays at Soho Theatre until Saturday 15 June 2024. For more information visit: https://sohotheatre.com/events/strategic-love-play-2/ 

Photos by Pamela Raith, from Strategic Love Play’s Edinburgh Fringe run in 2023