The City

First published on 1 Jun 2009. Updated on 5 Apr 2011.

Christopher (Colin Moody) works in finance; his wife Clair (Belinda McClory) translates novels. He's anxious for his job; she's just had an unsettling encounter with a famous author called Mohammed, whose autobiographical books contain graphic violence and torture. Their neighbour Jenny (Anita Hegh) is a nurse who works the night shift and is unhappy about the noise Clair and Christopher's children make while she's trying to sleep. Jenny's absent husband is a doctor, away fighting a "secret war".

The City is the latest play by UK experimentalist Martin Crimp, whose recent work has gone so far as to dispense with character and plot altogether. Thankfully The City has both engaging characters and a storyline, albeit a storyline that is not quite linear, rather a zigzag, much like the seven-tiered staircase that comprises Ralph Myers' set. At first glance I thought the play had been relocated to Martin Place ('The City' being what Londoners call their financial district) but the massive stairs more likely represent the play's seven scenes, which are separated by sudden 20-second blackouts. Clair, Christopher and Jenny don't so much converse as deliver little speeches, directed at the audience. They don't quite connect with each other; physically and conceptually, they're all on different levels.   

When we meet one of Christopher and Clair's kids (eight-year-old Georgia Bowery on opening night - she alternates in the role with Gigi Perry), she's telling dirty limericks and wearing an identical, miniature version of Jenny's nurse's uniform. So we know things aren't quite as they seem. It's all vaguely threatening, like the shifting perspectives of a painting by De Chirico, or something out of David Lynch. The actors' unnerving ability to change costume during those brief blackouts adds to the play's surreal mood.

This engrossing if elliptical piece is a good fit for Benedict Andrews, a director with little time for realism in the theatre. It holds a convex mirror up to contemporary urban life, expressing the uncertainties of an age of financial crisis, random invasion and globalisation. It also has the good sense to stop at the 80-minute mark before its riddles get too cute or tiresome. Nick Dent