Taking an affectionate rib at the style of Harold Pinter (and The Birthday Party in particular), Paul Kalburgi’s quirky and darkly comic play stops off at The Old Red Lion Theatre’s Grimfest for an evening of chills.
Vernon and Kenny (a long ‘resting’ professional) wish to start an amateur theatre group in their parlour. With a planned cast of six and most of the Pinter play available, they aim to improvise the second act.
This is all recounted after the event to an invisible visitor, the vicar’s wife. Because it transpired that far from an amusing interlude into Pinter prose, the evening became somewhat Pinteresque and ended in a series of events that evolved into the blackest of tales.
The ideas are sharp, funny, and nicely absurd, with Kalburgi’s ear for rhythm and a sense of character observation drawing us into the events being told to us.
A surprising second half of Almost The Birthday Party places two more characters from the story centre stage, and a sense of unease, malice, and danger is as present as Stanley might have found it at The Birthday Party itself.
The play, directed by Scott Le Crass with great pacing and precision despite a rather sedentary presentation, never feels forced or too ridiculous. The set is minimal – sofa, lamp, and a picture of a cat – while the Theatre’s two doors make it easy to colour in the rest.
Bernard O’Sullivan and John Rayment settle into their roles with relish, making it less of a cartoon and more of a caution. Both are required to create contrasting characters we have to believe in for an hour, and we do enthusiastically.
The twist is dealt with well, drip-fed to us throughout the play, but at first appearing to be a McGuffin. You may well come away from this with the knowledge of ‘the perfect murder’ while cheering on the killer’s yen to dispose of those who slight them.
Almost The Birthday Party played at Grimfest 17-20 Oct.
*****