I had the pleasure of reviewing Tim Keogh’s play “Thorn” last year where he explored the adolescent life of Steven Morrissey that provided the audience with a real insight into the main himself – my expectations were set very high for his attempt to recreate the formation of The Rolling Stones and the ultimate downfall of the man responsible – Brian Jones.
The play starts with the very first meeting between Brian Jones (Stan Rawlings), Keith Richards (Dean Dixon) and Mick Jagger (Frank Williams) – Richards and Jagger were already good friends having grown up together in Kent. Jones was very clearly the more knowledgeable and experienced musician and he knew it. He took control of the very raw other members who were simply taking a ride on Jones’ coat-tails at that point – Jones was the leader of the band. The year was 1962 and The Rolling Stones were very much a blues band – despite other members of the band wanting to play a more Rock and Roll style.
The scenes come and go very quickly in “Out Of Time”, interspersed with Rolling Stones tracks loudly playing through the speakers as the lights go down. It is not long before we meet Pat Andrews (Rebecca Ryder) who is Jones’ girlfriend at the time and mother of his child. She has followed him from Cheltenham where Jones left in a hurry and burnt his bridges with the town he grew up in – preferring to move to the thriving city of London where the music scene would be able to support him.
We never get to meet The Rolling Stones’ Manager but his name is mentioned several times – Andrew Oldham. An initial telephone call between Jones and Oldham creates an agreement that Jones is paid more than the other members of the band – something that later became an issue for Jagger and Richards when they saw the contract. It is believed that Oldham encouraged Jagger and Richards to start writing their own material which created tension between them and Brian Jones.
One of my favourite scenes in the play is a contrived exchange between Jagger and Richards where they seemingly start writing their first single – “As Time Goes By”. I believe the truth is that their first writing experience was “Tell Me” but this did not matter and the scene led to some humorous exchanges between the two of them as they came up with lyrics and a melody.
Shortly before the interval we were introduced to Jones’ new glamourous girlfriend Anita Pallenberg (Sofi-Jo Bennett) – someone Jones was clearly very proud to have on his arm. It is said that Jones and Pallenberg were taking a lot of acid during their relationship which caused Jones to have nightmares and paranoid experiences where he thought he was being followed by the FBI. The play dealt very well with their break-up during a holiday in Morocco where their relationship became violent. Pallenberg would later enter into a relationship with Keith Richards that lasted many years longer and involved three children.
The second half of the play covered the period where Jones slowly became estranged from the band as his appearances at the recording studio became more erratic and he moved to his Sussex country estate. His paranoia continued but he found a friend in Mary Hallett (Julie Root) who was his housekeeper but became a replacement mother for Jones after his relationship with his own parents had been non-existent after leaving Cheltenham.
“Out Of Time” deals with the rarely told story of Brian Jones and shows off just how influential he was in creating The Rolling Stones. He was clearly a hugely talented musician but was a flawed character and was very insecure about his talent – he also became a drug addict in the late 1960s at a time when very little was understood about addiction. The story of Brian Jones is brought to life in this production with a truly stunning performance from Stan Rawlings who carries off the character of Brian Jones perfectly – it could have been Jones himself on stage. However, the writing of Tim Keogh continues to be the driving force behind the little known stories of the stars of rock and roll – something I hope he never stops pursuing and I cannot wait to see what is next.
Reviewer - John Fish
on - 15/3/19
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