With a title like How to Survive a Zombie Apocalypse, you
might be forgiven for expecting a Walking Dead-style, post-apocalyptic drama.
Instead, Narthen Production’s play, written by Jonathan Hall, presents an
episodic drama which explores the friendship between 52-year-old teacher and
Deputy Head Phil (Tobias Christopher) and the 29-year-old climber and zombie
film enthusiast Mark (Lee Petcher). While there are helpful hints on how to
survive a zombie apocalypse (“Don’t go it alone,” to give one example)
projected between scenes, said zombie apocalypse is actually an extended
metaphor for life, love, and complicated love-lives.
The production, solidly directed by Andy Pilkington, made
use of a minimalist set, with a couple of blocks which were reconfigured
depending on the setting (a bench, a bed, or removed altogether). Short videos
were projected before each scene which displayed the rule for surviving the
titular apocalypse as well as providing a sense of setting for the upcoming
scene: a train station or the landscape of the Lake District, for instance. The
videos also had the additional function of covering the scene changes; the
episodic structure of the piece meant swift changes in locations and time, and
a small backstage crew worked swiftly to get the changes done in the time the
videos played.
The play’s eight scenes presented audiences with a snapshot
of the developing friendship between its two characters. Phil is on a school
trip at a climbing centre, stuck at the top of a pole and in the throes of a
panic attack when one of the centre’s employees, Mark, manages to calm him down
and encourages Phil to face his fears. From this opening scene, the two meet
again and strike up a friendship – both men enjoy films with a science-fiction
bent, for Mark it is zombie films while Phil prefers his sci-fi with less
undead and more eeriness, namechecking The Village of the Damned and the 1961 British
sci-fi film The Day the Earth Caught Fire. Mark opens up about his relationship
with Michelle and reveals to Phil that they are ‘on a break’ as she really
wants children and yet Mark feels uneasy with the notion of parenthood. Phil,
meanwhile, is in a long-term relationship with Patrick but the excitement of
the early days has been replaced with a more mundane lifestyle or, as he puts
it (via one of several sparkling lines in the play), “You start off with
Heathcliff and end up with Homer Simpson!” After a brief, drunken kiss, the two
men decide to put that incident behind them and Mark encourages Phil to tackle
the lengthy walk around the Old Man of Coniston. Soon, though, their friendship
becomes more physical and Phil feels conflicted between the excitement of a
relationship with Mark and his comfortable life with Patrick.
As Mark, Petcher brings a certain geeky enthusiasm when
talking about his love of zombie films and provides some nice comic touches to
the wittier lines in the script. Christopher’s performance as Phil worked best
during his quieter, more philosophical moments, in some of the more emotionally
charged moments he did seem to shout and over-emphasise more than was perhaps
necessary. Of note was the moment where Phil points out to Mark that life
wasn’t like a neatly structured zombie film with order, disruption, and
resolution but that it was a constantly chaotic mess. Here, Christopher brought
a sense of “having learnt this lesson the hard way” to Phil and it was very
effective.
How to Survive a Zombie Apocalypse is a solid production which
does provide some nice wit and humour amongst the emotional turmoil. With an
additional draft or two of the script, it could become even better. More could
have been made of Mark’s decision to instigate a more physical relationship
with Phil – was it out of loneliness, curiosity, or was it just a reflection of
the (so-called) ‘millennial’ generation’s more open attitude to sexuality
(where the traditional binaries are situated on a fluctuating scale)? It would
also have been nice to get more of a flavour of how Phil felt about his
changing relationship with Mark, as it was, their physical moments together
were brushed away within a few lines. Nevertheless, the play was enjoyable and
was solidly produced, acted, and directed. If Narthen Productions want to
develop the play further then a redrafted script with more emotionally charged
material would give the actors more to get their teeth into and give the
audience a real sense that, by the end of the play, the characters have truly
survived a zombie apocalypse, metaphorically speaking. As it stands, the show
is a charming, often witty, story of friendship and love and that is by no
means a bad thing in these often-fraught times.
Reviewer - Andrew Marsden
on – 21/07/18
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