Bedtime Solos at The Old Red Lion

In theatre, as in life, sex done right is the richest experience in the world.

Samuel Miller’s direction of Jakob Holder’s Bedtime Solos playing at The Old Red Lion Theatre for the next week is based around an identity-less couple having sex three times in one night.

Dressed in grey, on a stage where the only scenery is a bed split physically in half, the man and woman take it in turns to deliver soliloquies, only occasionally interacting directly.

This play tells so many stories. The first is the gradual unfolding of these two unnamed characters’ individual histories which come out through fantasies and memories triggered by being in bed together. Both characters have dealt with deep tragedy and it is a testament to Jakob Holder’s skill as a playwright that he can make throwaway points like: tragedy stays with you forever. It waves its ghoulish hand during intimate moments.

The second story is more hopeful dealing, as it does, with two restless souls forging a connection. From the beginning of the play, before the situation has even reached a conclusion, it’s clear that this is not just cheap sex. The characters have a rhythm, a patter, even in their distance. If I can be allowed to quote a poet without causing people to mutter, ‘twat’ then I turn to Rilke who said: ‘Once the realisation is accepted that even between the closest human beings infinite distances continue, a wonderful living side by side can grow.’

So, uh, yeah…what he said.

Caps (and not the internal kind) should be well and truly doffed to Scott Christie and Heather Wilds who play the two leads with tough yet vulnerable energy – just what you need for sensitive sex.

The third story is the lightest, most familiar version of sex. The one where, to no avail, the guy is willing himself not to come by thinking about dead, one-eyed cats in the gutter and the girl is saying ‘it’s ok, I enjoyed it, I just want to be with you’.  The script is dead on the mark at these parts and the humour is welcome after the more fucked elements of these characters have played out.

During some of the denser parts of Holder’s script, I must confess that like an unattentive lover, I zoned out and lost the plot, but this criticism is a mere boil on the heel of an Adonis – a nothing in the shadow of a beautiful shape. To all lovers of sex in its crazy, dirty, tormented glory, this play is a must-see.

Bedtime Solos is playing until Saturday 26 September at:

Old Red Lion Theatre
418 St John Street
Angel
EC1V 4NJ

Box Office: 020 7837 7816

Photo by Christian Alegria