Deadlock is a drama/thriller about personal blackmail, revenge, and their consequences. There's a cast of four (1F, 3M). It's in two acts; running time is 2hr 30mins overall, including a 20-minute interval.

Robert Marlowe (Simon Ward) is a Conservative Member of Parliament who likes to make sculptures of rent boys in the basement of his house. The door they enter through has a dead-lock to prevent easy escape, and there's a closed-circuit camera trained on it. He has a marriage - for the sake of appearances only - with Isabel Marlowe (Karen Drury). She conducts her own affairs and separate life, and is usually not at home. Ex-soldier Mark Dalton (Richard Driscoll) is Robert Marlowe's resident personal assistant, protector of his secrets, procurer of his young men.

Lippy rent-boy Brett (Ashley George) likes bondage, but dies doing it in the basement. Things look bad for Marlowe. But being a sculptor, he has a high-temperature kiln. Resourceful Mark Dalton steps in to protect his master. Nobody knows Brett was here, and that kiln - it's large enough to take a full-size bronze, why not a body? Marlowe's reluctant. After all, it was an accident. But the scandal would finish his career. All looks tidy until, next morning, Brett's twin arrives looking for his brother.

It's not possible to mention more of the plot, because an essence of Deadlock is its exceptionally devious story-line, which name-checks the plot of (Gilbert & Sullivan's comic opera) The Mikado, and includes timed letters and a lock-up garage among many devices. Writer Peter Benedict continually ties the action to the reality of the characters. They're shrewd, intelligent, cunning, manipulative people - just like human beings. So, Marlowe is much smarter than he seems at first, and the time skips along lightly as the characters get more and more interlocked in sparring and out-thinking each other. There are several clever surprises, more hair-pin plot bends than a Greek mountain (but without the sodomy - Deadlock won't scare the horses). There's some entertaining parodying of actors and acting in a sub-plot, and some close-up, slow, extreme violence. Phew - and that's just act one. Dialogue generally zips along, except when Robert Marlowe is over-pompous for too long, which happens sometimes. But he gets some good one-liners. Questioned about the inconsistency of his being gay and having 'been with a woman', he replies 'I've been up the Eiffel Tower. It doesn't make me a Frenchman.' And about his wife: 'Isabel's had more members between her thighs than my party has in Parliament'

Simon Ward gives an easy and laconic authority to the central character of Robert Marlowe. He's given a complex range of moods and dialogue from the script and gets the character moving through them without visible acting, a fine achievement. His Robert is shifty and smart, usually a couple of steps ahead of his competitors - a politician true to life. Simon Ward gives a warmth, depth and credibility to a character who, looked at coldly, is a monster. Richard Driscoll delivers Mark Dalton with conviction and subtle nuance. He creates a character seemingly turning on a cauldron of suppressed emotions, but reins them in so they stay invisible - very clever. There are spoken references to the character's troubled past, but it's Richard Driscoll's evocation of the effects of these, quietly suggested rather than shouted, that make them glisten. Karen Drury has all too few lines and appearances as Isabel Marlowe. A minus of the script is that there isn't more of this immensely interesting character and superb actor. Isabel is written quite 2-dimensionally, as an essential plot component rather than a person, but the actor gets a lot out of her. Karen Drury produces a character who could bring a lot of additional sparkle to the play, given a few pages more to speak. Ashley George is highly entertaining as rent-boy Brett and twin. It's a part confined to a section of the play, but with plenty of lines and stage-time. Ashley George gets the most out of the characters and the startling range of emotions involved - fully convincing as predator, prey, bully, street-boy, lovey - all with panache.

Peter Benedict directs robustly, keeping the story (he wrote it) punching along and the timing tight (he's an experienced farceur - Fire Down Under!). Lighting designer Nic Barnes and sound designer Ed Brimley blend their work deftly into the action. Wardrobe mistress Deidra Whelan produces superb costumes, and is also credited as understudy. There's a detailed set designed by Michael Holt - a basement with a couple of staircases, kitchen, phones, fridge, and that big oven. It works well to the action - there's a fair amount of movement and the set needs to do many practical things. Above all, it looks good - it looks right for the cunning and character of the man who uses it. There's something about its period-feel too, that carries subtle conviction, matching the man. It's also exact for what writer Peter Benedict is doing with the script - re-discovering the genre of the domestic thriller. It's a bold experiment - sweeping aside the whole bunch of post-war playwright bores (though the set does contain a kitchen sink), their infantile pauses, mannered stances and dull introspection, and inventing a brand-new 21st Century play using the tools of the early 1950s. It feels lively and of now - above all, it grips till the last minute. There are some ponderous points, some bits that are unconvincing (not many), but in a play of this speed, with all its dodges and flips, they don't count. It's embarrassing to admit to enjoying the theatre - usually it's supposed to be doing one good, like prunes.

Cast Credits: (alpha order): Richard Driscoll - Mark Dalton. Karen Drury - Isabel Marlowe. Ashley George - Brett. Simon Ward - Robert Marlowe. Understudies: Oliver Wallace, Deidra Whelan, Peter Yapp.

Company Credits: Writer - Peter Benedict. Director - Peter Benedict. Designer - Michael Holt. Lighting Designer - Nic Barnes. Sound - Ed Brimley. Production Manager - Digby Robinson. Assistant Production Manager - Dan Rainsford. Costume Supervisor - Bill Butler. Company Stage Manager - Andrew Jolly. Deputy Stage Manager - Irmi Hager. Wardrobe Mistress - Deidra Whelan. Co-Producer - Nick Brooke Limited & Anthony Field Associates Limited. Co-Producer - Churchill Theatre, Bromley. Churchill Theatre Bromley Credits: Chief Executive - Derek Nicholls. Operations Manager - Christopher Glover. Production Manager - Digby Robinson. Financial Controller - Liz Gentry. Press Officer - Jenny Keeling. DL (TP) Credits: Production Assistant - Valerie Taylor. Press & Marketing - Jane Morgan Associates (tel 020 7263 9867). Graphic Design - Melonseed Design. Production Photography - Manuel Harlan. Set painted by - Visual Scene. Additional Furniture made by - Michalis Kokkliadis. Insurance - Walton and Parkinson Limited. Transportation - Paul Mathew Transport. Nick Brooke Limited Credits: Producers - Nick Brooke, Philip Noel. Ambassador Theatre Group Credits: Chairman - Sir Eddie Kulukundis OBE. Deputy Chairman - Peter Beckwith. Joint Chief Executive and Creative Director - Howard Panter. Joint Chief Executive - Rosemary Squire.

END

John Park

reviewed Tuesday 15 May 07 / Bromley Churchill Theatre

Fringe Report (c) Fringe Report 2002-2008