UK Theatre Network

THE GOD OF SOHO

BY CHRIS HANNAN

at the Shakespeare’s Globe

 ‘There used to be a certain amount of solidarity in all things but now what happens?  Everything is exposed to the public gaze.  Veils are thrown back, every wound is probed by careless fingers, we are forever present at an orgy of scandalous revelations.’ Fyodor Dostoevs

© Writer: Tremayne

We are lead into the show by a live band, whose sound is not unlike that of Suggs.  The front man encourages us, the audience, to raise our hands in the air in response to the music, and directs us to switch off our mobile phones.  An alternative, more imaginative way of incorporating stage directions into a performance, I felt, delivering them through a poetic-type Rap.

It is then that we establish we are in a camp-type heaven, as Phil Daniels, who plays Big God utters, ‘you can’t come back unless you forgive him, that’s the law I’m afraid’, to his daughter, who, when he exits, is set up as The Goddess of Love.

In the third scene the handbag tramp Edwardo (Richard Clews) comes across as holding all the secrets to celebrity star Natty’s life. She is played by Emma Pierson (best known to television viewers for the part she played in Hotel Babylon.) The God of Soho is her stage debut and she appears to thrive on publicity!

When The Goddess of Love finds herself in the company of Edwardo, he asks her if she has any illnesses.  He is blatantly obsessed with his own, having already made it known that he considers himself to be a bi-polar schizophrenic.  He seems highly disappointed when he learns she is of sound mind and body.

Big God delivers many corker lines but the most memorable is, when he says, ‘I’ll eat this problem and shit it!’

‘..From Hollywood’s earliest days there are reports of fans requesting film star’s soap, a chewed piece of gum, cigarette butts, lipstick tissues and even a blade of grass from a star’s lawn..  The term St Thomas effect refers to the compulsion  to authenticate a desired object by travelling to it, touching it and photographing it.’
Chris Rojek, Celebrity
 

We are at now about a third of the way through the play and, out of the corner of my eye, I spot one of  the Critics in my row make a swift exit. I felt this was unfair, not to hang on and allow the story to develop.

The Goddess of Love encourages Natty to go to open the bag, something the New God (William Mannering) sees from up above. 

His previous disinterest in her switches to immediate interest. The bag is a potential time bomb waiting to self destruct at any moment, a lethal weapon  that could be used to blackmail Natty  which The Goddess of Love tries to bring to her attention.

Photos are what’s inside and these expose Natty playing with sex toys. We, the audience, then learn that Natty’s sister Teresa (Jade Williams),  is, in fact, homeless, which cleverly enables playwright (Chris Hannan) to show the extreme differences there are in class.

My preferred character in the play would have to be Mrs God (Miranda Foster) displays great comic timing, particularly in her response line to Big God, who has said the line: ‘What’s the difference between class?’, as she comes back matter of factly to him with, ‘The difference between you and me, dear!’  Brilliant!.

Natty, convinced that her sort of boyfriend, Baz (Edward Hogg) had the handbag planted expressly to ruin her reputation as a Celebrity,  says to him: ‘you took private things that belonged to me, then scattered them around the streets’.  She then makes a comparison between Sex and a scratchcard, implying that you feel very excited before the act, only soon to be upset by a disappointing comedown.

Natty tackles Baz saying: ‘why’d you do it? You’re never gonna win?’, only highlighting the fact that she is of a higher status than him.

Her sister, Teresa reveals the bag to the audience, with the sex toys intact.

The stage is made up of neon lights, the type you would expect to find around  a dressing room mirror in fluorescent pink, which spell out the words ‘heaven’.  There is a pop art version of Marilyn Monroe towards the back of the stage. Think Andy Warhol.

‘you had a self questioning beauty’, the words spoken by the Young God, who finds himself in the company of the Goddess of Love, hit with the realisation that he has fallen for her.  Natty asks Baz if he has anything more to add, after her sister suggests she uses Charity as a means to help promote her Celebrity.

In Act II Natty’s sister, Teresa, proves to have a good singing voice.

The overacting that becomes part and parcel of Celebrityland is displayed at its fullest at Natty’s mother’s Funeral.  Here Natty is dressed in something you would imagine on Sophia Loren, sexy even at a time of sadness.  Also Baz rocks up with a vulgar, heart-shaped wreath.  A strong message should be read from this scene and that is how the Celebrity thrives off ‘a big fat crisis!’

From ‘falsity’ we move to ‘forgiveness’, when Baz asks the Goddess of Love to get bag Natty’s bag to spare her any humiliation.

The New God is given some of the more poetic lines, and he would otherwise be inconspicuous, were it not for his fine delivery and presence on stage.

An amusing scene follows with Baz and Natty in a hotel room trying to put the spice back in their sex life.  Baz looks on the bag as having been the item to spoil everything, saying ‘shit that needs to be buried!’

Many comparisons may be drawn from the two sisters, rich versus poor, the positive and pitiful steps we choose to take in life, and those that we have had decided for us.

The final words of the piece are spoken by the Goddess of Love as she removes her gown to reveal her nakedness.  One could take this to mean one of two things but most of all that, as humans, none of us is perfect, we all have imperfections but we all come from the same body.

The Cast then enter the stage one by one, Baz and Natty at first, locked in an embrace having laid any issues they had to rest.  The ending is brought to a crazy close just as it had begun, leaving the audience with an uplifting feeling to take away with them.