This reviewer has just spent the past few hours retrospectively researching background information about this new play currently running on the main stage at Altrincham's Garrick Theatre.
Titled, 'Let The Right One In', this is a play based on the 2004 horror fiction novel of the same name by Swedish author John Ajvide Lindqvist. There have been two film adaptations and the novel has been translated into many different languages, and has become something of a cult classic. Nevertheless, until this evening it had obviously passed me by! If my research is anything to go by, the play only truly touches the surface of the novel and its themes, and either makes assumptions that the audience are already up-to-speed on certain plot points and character background, or feels that their omission and / or ambiguity help to keep the main storyline clear and offer the audience member food for thought long after they have left the auditorium. I would agree with all of these hypothoses.
In very simplistic terms, a young 12 year old boy named Oskar is, for reasons not made clear in the stage play, far more reserved and naive than his peers. Is he a little slow or what we would have classed as retarded? or is it that he has been accustomed to being both suffocated and abused by his mother that makes him the way he is. He is bullied by his classmates, and he dreams of wreaking revenge on them. Enter Eli, an androgynous girl of about the same age, and she recognises Oskar as being different. They form an unlikely alliance, nay friendship, which develops through the course of the play into something altogether more sexual and sinister, as we, and indeed he too, learns that Eli is a vampire. Deaths occur, police search, bullies are mutilated, and Eli and Oskar find solace in each other and leave together to parts unknown. However, we know that it will not end well for Oskar, he is simply being used by Eli as her next host and source of blood.
The production holds very little back. The effects are both superb and clever, and there is plenty of blood. The set works well for the most part, as a composite affair of swimming pool hidden under school or apartment steps, silver birch trees, lots of snow, and a children's climbing frame. My only concern here being that action taking place on the frame is obscured from view if seated on the far left of the auditorium. The scene changes are swift, although there are too many, and perhaps a different way if incorporating some more of the different locations into the composite set would have worked a little better. Like the novel and indeed the films, thhe scenes here are very short and many, each adding a different and new layer to the plot.
Charlie Gallagher as Oskar is superb. His body language, voice and demeanor together creating a studied and realistic portrayal of a disturbed, bullied, abused, confused, often scared young teenager. His interactions with Eli, played again with great panache by Chloe Arrowsmith had superb chemistry, and Arrowsmith was simply electric as the youngster caught between childhood and the need for blood. Her body language and her lightning quick mood changes were precise and pitched perfectly.
The entire cast supported these two protagonists with skill, but a special mention must be given to Rhys Nuttall as Hakan, giving an intense and physically interesting show of his blood-collecting and love of Eli.
The play also features a searing contemporary score, as if we were actually watching a film, and this helped the production immeasurably. Deftly composed by Mark Goggins.
This was opening night and there were a couple of times when there was a dip, and the energy was lost slightly, but overall this is simply a superb production, and one that continues to keep Altrincham Garrick at the forefront of challenging and experimental amateur theatre. Their current season is a complete mix of old and new, familiar and unknown, standards and risks. This play I would imagine fell into the last category, but it was a risk well worth taking. I shall be thinking about this play for a long time to come.
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