At its 1997 premiere, Patrick Marber’s partner-swapping four-hander seemed thrillingly fresh and frank in its exploration of attraction, betrayal, and jealousy. Though the milieu and trappings now render it a period piece – cigarettes, clunky mobiles, the wondrous ‘new’ internet! – Clare Lizzimore’s searingly good revival shows it’s also a modern classic, comparable to Pinter’s Betrayal. It’s starkly staged, deftly cast, and unflinching about the randomness and brutality of love.
It begins in St Bart’s A&E, where obituarist and wannabe writer Dan has brought beguiling sometime stripper Alice after she was hit by a taxi in Blackfriars. They fall into infatuated cohabitation and he writes a novel about her. Then he propositions Anna, the classy but possibly damaged photographer taking his author photo.
