David Hare‘s 1975 play (with music), Teeth ‘n’ Smiles, comes back to the West End after fifty years. Set in 1969 at the May Ball at Jesus College, Cambridge University, it focuses on a failing rock band, Maggie Frisby and the Skins, who have been invited to play.
Inspired by the Rolling Stones having to do the same thing under contract at Oxford at the height of their 1960s fame, Teeth ‘n’ Smiles captures the raucous band dynamics, raw misogyny, and rapid disillusionment of the times.
When this was first staged, punk was around the corner, and several major rock icons had lived and died in the fast lane (Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison). Now it has the feel of a curious antique, despite the casting of Rebecca Lucy Taylor, aka Self Esteem, in the role of Maggie.
As Self Esteem, Taylor is a singer and songwriter who has risen from a cult following to mainstream status, and joins this cast following a successful run up the road in Cabaret.
The Skins are a rock band in crisis. Their bass guitarist, Peyote (a brilliantly comic Jojo Macari), lives in a fog of drugs and dares. Maggie’s former mentor and partner, Arthur (a restrained Michael Fox), is stuck between his ambition and thwarted love for what might have been.
Wilson (Michael Abubakar), on keyboard, is obsessed with boring trivia. Smegs (Samuel Jordan) is the earnest, committed, and focused guitarist, and Nash (Bill Caple), the drummer, is strangely introverted.
With them are the rather ineffective roadie, Inch (Noah Wetherby), and publicist Laura (played by Levi Heaton at this performance), who has her own demons to carry.
When their slightly-creepy manager Seraffian (Phil Daniels), with his jam-jar glasses and potential new star, Randolph (Joseph Evans), in tow, appears, what were simply hairline cracks in the band’s career become yawning chasms.
This feels very much like two plays sandwiched together. The opening act shows Maggie as deeply addicted to drugs and pills, hardly able to function, peevish, cruel, and damaged.
The songs by Nick Bicât and Tony Bicât – the third, “My Sour Blood”, given new focus and fire by Taylor – are loud, unhinged, and violent. By the second act, this has changed, as Maggie’s position has, and numbers without her, such as “Bastards,” add a more urgent political cry to arms to the story, which in turn feels reflective.
A handful of peripheral characters are there for commentary on the life of a rock ‘n’ roller. Head porter Snead (Christopher Patrick Nolan) is icily polite, while young medical student Anson (Roman Asde) finds himself in off-stage trouble which might come under “be careful what you wish for”.
This revival of Teeth ‘n’ Smiles is a little discordant, with a sense of history weighing on its discussions of the demise of rock ‘n’ roll and the catastrophic events of wartime at the London Café de Paris, both within recent living memory in 1975.
It is set (Chloe Lamford‘s design) in the cavernous space of the Duke of York’s stage with a performance platform that moves forward for the gig songs, and a backstage area, furnished with an assortment of chairs, sofas, and detritus, at other times.
Hare’s female characters are tricky to connect with under a modern lens. Laura is defined solely by her attachment to Arthur, and is even extorted at one point to “sell her body” to raise band funds. Maggie is struggling to stay afloat in a sea of pain, mainly of her own making. She is content enough to sing her ex-lover’s words night after night, but when it comes to saying something unscripted, she hides behind insults, drama, and abuse.
It is difficult to view Teeth ‘n’ Smiles without also thinking of the recent West End visitor to this theatre, Stereophonic, also a play with music about band dynamics. It comes from a different place and focus, and Maggie is certainly heavily reminiscent of Joplin, with perhaps just a touch of Grace Slick from Jefferson Airplane.
It foreshadows the rise of punk rebellion while celebrating pop culture moments of instability, such as Jim Morrison exposing himself on stage or Hendrix deliberately wearing trousers a size too tight while playing guitar with his teeth.
In the 21st century, Maggie and her Skins would doubtless be social media superstars, breaking into pieces before our eyes in fly-on-the-wall livestreams. The bubbles that once sheltered and stifled musicians have long since burst. There is a place for this revival, and I certainly enjoyed seeing it in the context of Hare’s later and more clearly politically focused works.
I’m giving it 3.5 stars. I’ll be thinking about it for a while, and seeing Taylor alone is worth the trip, as her Maggie is terrific. I just wish I’d been older than a toddler on its first run to see the impact it would have had then.
Teeth ‘n’ Smiles continues at the Duke of York’s until 6 Jun with details here.
Photo credit: Helen Murray