The first in-house production at Riverside Studios, RON, is very clearly badged as ‘not a stand-up’ despite writer, co-director, and solo performer Ted Walliker opting to start it like one.
He plays Tony, gay and easily influenced by his childhood friend, Mike, always seeking his attention, approval, and validation.
RON is bleak, black, and disturbing. The title refers to a McDonald’s employee of that name who is terrorised and kidnapped by Tony and Mike in some kind of twisted heist plot.
Fuelled by drink, drugs, and in Tony’s case, desire, the pair enter into a journey of violence, harm, and destruction that would do A Clockwork Orange proud.
Walliker’s language owes a debt to both Anthony Burgess and Steven Berkoff – strutting, clever, flowery – adding in a few weak jokes to underscore that RON is not meant to be funny.
Random acts of brutality are twinned with childhood memories of meeting, following, wanting. Tony, by far the quickest to cause physical harm, makes himself personable to his ‘audience’.
The content warnings flag ‘descriptions of bloody violence,’ but if you are at all squeamish, check first. In telling the story and playing every character – including a mysterious woman presented in shadow puppetry – Walliker’s play may suggest parallels with Jack Holden’s KENREX, but it does not yet have that show’s confidence or assurance.
Instead, RON suggests a British Bonnie & Clyde or Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb (Rope, Thrill Me) set-up, of a pair who seek the thrill of blood and fear. Mike is a close cousin of Carlin, from Roy Minton’s TV play, Scum, seeking that place of authority.
RON is an anarchic play, where no character has a redeeming feature, and Tony’s narration leads into a conclusion I easily guessed early on. Walliker’s performance is deeply physical – again, a Berkoff influence? – and the character he creates is utterly repellent.
Together with co-director Lev Govorovski, Walliker has designed a set that hides a surprise, and his lighting offers brightness, red washes, and more to enhance the story.
The ink-black comedy raised occasional giggles from one area of the audience, but my emotional connection to the show was in the doomed romance existing in Tony’s mind, and in Mike’s brief hallucination of his mother.
RON has many redeeming qualities, but without heading down either the literally gory route or a tense exploration of psychosis, it doesn’t quite catch an even tone.
I found myself wanting just a little more – I recalled the impact of Mark Ravenhill’s Shopping and F**king and its frank exploration of violence and queerness, or Sarah Kane’s Cleansed and its lens on queer desire.
Walliker’s vision fits in this space – as well as with Joe Orton’s Entertaining Mr Sloane – but needs a bit more faith to leave its audience dazed and unsettled.
Three stars.
RON is at Riverside Studios until 5 Jul. Tickets here.
Photo credit: Percy Walker-Smith