This play is set in the 80s' and is about Bob, a married man who is cheating on his wife, Michelle, by having sex with his two 15 year old babysitters, Rita and Sue. This is Andrea Dunbar’s semi-autobiographical play, written for the Royal Court Theatre in 1982 when she was just 19, is a vivid portrait of girls caught between brutal childhood and an unpromising future, both hungry for adult adventure set in Bradford.
In my opinion, this is a controversial play yet it makes important points about issues that are still relevant today. Grooming still happens today, unfortualty. For me this play was very shocking and uncomfortable to watch, especially in scene 1 when Rita and Sue have sex with Bob for the first time. it was uncomfortable for me to watch as I wasn’t expecting it and hadn't seen something like that on stage before thus it was shocking. Yet, the play is shocking as it is talking about grooming and under age sex.
For me I didn’t really enjoy watching this play, yet I know many other people did. I felt disappointed in a way because when it ended I didn’t feel like it was a proper ending and didn’t leave the theatre thinking this was the best thing I had seen or I wasn’t amazing. It was interesting to watch how they interpreted this play and how these issues that are brought up are still relevant today. Even though really it isn't, you could say this was also a pollical play as Margret Thatcher is mentioned as it shows how some off her polices she implemented effected the lowest of class.
The acting was good during the performance and at times you really felt for the characters; for example when Bob has lost his job and thinks he needs to sell his car to make enough money. Throughout you feel empathy for the female characters. For me I felt more empathy and sympathy for the character Michelle as she was Bob's wife and had to deal with her husband playing away and their constant arguing. Also in the end, once Michelle has the guts to kick Bob out he just goes straight to Rita and Michelle hoped they could get back together as they have two kids and she does still love him; therefore I felt more empathy towards this character as she didn’t choose for this to happen to her, yet Sue and Rita in some sense had a choice even though it might not have been an easy choice to make. The characters depicted in this play are the lowest of the low so they are lower class and have nothing. My favourite character was Sue's mother, as I found her quite funny even when she was being stern and arguing with Sue's father. The way she walked on stage, you could tell immediately that she meant business and wasn’t messing about, whenever she spoke she was blunt yet for an audience member this was humorous to watch. Talking of humorous, the out of the two main girls, Rita was also the most humorous at the start as she came across as quite innocent yet really neither her or Sue were that innocent.
I enjoyed the music played throughout the production and was used to great effect for transitions between scenes. The lighting would change to a blue flood light and the music would be played. The set was very minimal and four cars seats were used throughout and moved around the stage and created different sets with just these four car seats. As a result, our focus was always on the actors and not concentrating on the set as it was simple.
What was interesting was the discussion after were a point was made that this play could have happened in any class and in any time period. As a result, this is kind of a sad thing that something like these events that happen in the play still happen; although at least the theatre is a good platform to put out this views to make more people aware. However, I may not have enjoyed this play yet it still makes me think of what world we live in if this kind of stuff still happens as really we live in such an advanced world that we should be able to stop events like these and we shouldn’t be worried or our daughters/sisters etc.
So, this wasn’t the best thing I have seen, it was ok. What this play really did for me was create more of an awareness of this issue. What would have been interesting they had set this play in the modern day to compare how they may of differed. Even though this play as the lower class getting in trouble we must remember it could happen to anyone doesn’t matter of class or race etc. To conclude, this play raises awareness which is still a good thing even though I didn’t completely enjoy watching it.
