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| Photo: Robert Day |
Forever Young is both utterly depressing and highly amusing at the same time. The play is set in the future - actually, in our generation's future old age. When we are in our dotage, the Playhouse will have been transformed into an Old People's Home for superannuated actors who while away the hours reminiscing about their careers and dead friends. Whilst they await the Grim Reaper they sing, fight, swear, drink and generally mess around as they exult in their second childhood. In some ways this is a follow-up to the aging punks of the Playhouse's recent Garage Band, and both plays include actors John Elkington and Mark Jardine.
The play's depiction of old age is pretty bleak. The residents are robbed of their dignity and bullied by Sister Sara as she occasionally pops in, singing to them about their imminent death. Once her back is turned, however, they are up on their feet and reenacting the great moments of their theatre careers or performing a geriatric strip-tease to Tom Jones. Their efforts to cope with old age generate a lot of slapstick humour including a very funny slow-motion fight sequence worthy of Laurel and Hardy. John Elkington, apparently struck with dementia, begins a song only to become distracted and wander into another song and then another, eventually producing a Jive Bunny-style medley of tunes.
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| Photo: Robert Day |
Playwright Erik Gedeon wrote this using his "Song Drama 2.0" technique where the story is told through a series of popular songs from the last forty years - a bit like the film Moulin Rouge - including the eponymous classic pop tune by Alphaville. This doesn't leave much time for dialogue and consequently at times the play drags a little as there isn't much of what you would call a plot. However, this fits the setting of an old people's home where nothing much ever changes and their are plenty of laughs along the way. The humour treads a fine line between edginess and really poor taste such as the scene where Rebecca Little sings 'Barbie Girl' when her artificial leg falls off. At times you are being invited to laugh at the difficulties caused by age and disability but at the same time you are made to sympathise with the old people who are in a tragic situation.
The audience loved the play and I think everyone, young and old, left the theatre both laughing and feeling suicidal.
Forever Young plays at the Nottingham Playhouse until Saturday 27 February 2010.
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