Thursday 18 October 2018

REVIEW: Lemons, Lemons, Lemons, Lemons, Lemons - The King's Arms, Salford.


According to the programme, the average person will speak 123, 205, 750 words in a lifetime. I'm going to write this review in 450 words.

Citrus Theatre Productions presents Sam Steiner's play about a dystopian world where there is a limit to how many words we can use. A law has been passed which caps our word usage. There is a clear political comment here on Government cuts and how to make the best out of a tough situation. It's about what we choose to say and how we say it. Examining censorship and equity versus equality.

The set with a multi-purpose platform was black and the lighting was rather cold in this unsettling world. Bernadette (Lucy Dixon) and Oliver (Sean Luttman) were the only things radiating warmth and positivity with their love for one another. White marks of dashes and lines were all over the stage, representing Morse code. The sound of Morse code was played in-between the fragmented and non-linear scenes of their time together as a couple.

A daily word limit brought a sense of urgency in their relationship, what they said to one other had to be to the point. They both had to say what they really felt. Tactfulness, therefore, was somewhat absent. It makes you think would any relationship be better if more people were just direct with what they said? However, I'm not saying their relationship was perfect; love is not perfect. If love wasn't already complicated enough, it was about to become more difficult in this context.

Throughout their relationship, you witnessed the unimportant conversations or the significant discourse. You watched the days where music became their happy language, or they wanted to get everything off their chest, or they didn't care about wasting words, or they wanted to choose them carefully. There were the moments when they were speechless.

What (really) resonated was the debate on using qualifiers such as, really. Why say you really like something, when you can just say you like something? It seems like you are trying to convince someone you hold that opinion; there is a falsity to it. It's a wasted word. They say couples form their own unique language, Oliver and Bernadette did, however it was made challenging because of the oppressive times they lived in.

Dixon and Luttman's portrayal of Bernadette and Oliver's relationship was full of nuances and detail. Within the one hour play, they were convincing and kept up the focus and energy throughout. The precision was amazing considering they switched from one scene to the next. I'm almost at the end of my review, all that's left to say is this was thought provoking and lemons, lemons, lemons, lemons, lemons.  

Reviewer - Sam Lowe
On - 17/10/18

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