Written by Siân Owen
Directed by Adam Quayle
The Lowry Theatre
★★★☆☆
How Soon Is Now? is an ambitious new production by Box Of Tricks. Writer Siân Owen celebrates the indie club scene of Nineties Manchester while also attempting a deep delve into female friendships on the dance floor and in the club toilets. There are big themes and much heartfelt dialogue about family trauma, coercive relationships and the daily stressors of working in the NHS. There is some real merit in some of the dialogue but the play ultimately never quite hits the mark it’s striving for.
The play is a celebration of the healing power connection, identity, belonging and an indictment of the increasingly complicated business of simply being human. Set in a nightclub on New Year’s Eve 1997, it has mates Angie and Polly out celebrating when they meet Welsh small town ingénue Jean who is lost and traumatised. Time moves back and forth to give fragments of all their stories while being interspersed with indie classics. When it catches fire, How Soon Is Now? has genuine emotional pull. There are moments of warmth, humour and vulnerability that suggest a production with something important to share. However this two act production struggles to hold attention as the dramatic arc feels fragmented sitting in this jukebox musical of undeniably great songs.
Ambition can sometimes be a double-edged theatrical sword and this production reaches so determinedly for significance that its message becomes somewhat diffused. Ideas are introduced with enthusiasm but not always given the space or dramatic precision to fully land. The result is a show that occasionally feels like a New Year celebration where not all the fireworks display light up as intended. The first Act goes out like a damp squid and suggests this production could have sparkled and had more impact with no interval and a shorter running time. The production’s heart is unquestionably in the right place; what it lacks is the consistency and finesse to make that heart beat as powerfully for the audience as it clearly does for those on stage.
There are some nicely judged performances and Darragh Cowley brings real charm and energy as a Manc DJ who spins the tunes and continually breaks the fourth wall to engage with the audience. Laura Robinson makes her professional theatrical debut as shop girl Polly and does a nice job of fleshing out her role and singing her heart out while maintaining a suitably flat Manchester accent. All the cast work hard, with three of them, doubling up as a live band in stage as well.
It is always great to see new writing being championed and smaller theatre companies going out on tour, and it’s brilliant to see that work being shown on larger stages like The Quays at The Lowry. There is much nostalgic pleasure here for anyone who was out in those heady nightclubs back in the Nineties and this production has some nice ideas and big ambitions which will hopefully develop and flourish as the tour continues.
