Tusk Tusk

Tusk Tusk. Polly Polly. Wow Wow. Brilliant Brilliant. This is the most exciting new stage work I have seen anywhere since Polly Stenham's last play That Face, which was also a Royal Court production directed by Jeremy Herrin.  The outrageously young author, who's about 21, has firmly knocked on the head any suspicions that her first success was some kind of fluke, and in some ways Tusk Tusk is even more impressive.  It makes just as big an impact without having Lindsay Duncan (a multiple Olivier winner) and Matt Smith (the next Dr Who) in its cast.  That Face had a dysfunctional mother being looked after by her Oedipal son, and this play explores very similar territory, except that in Tusk Tusk the mother has vanished, leaving her three children -- two damaged teenagers and a small boy -- on their own in a new flat full of cardboard boxes.  Eliot is almost sixteen, and his sister Maggie is fourteen, while Finn is just seven and still in the territory of Maurice Sendak's Where The Wild Things Are, a strangely adult children's story which echoes through the text.  The trio of posh kids lead a semi-savage existence, isolated in a city where they know almost nobody, reluctant to confront the possibility that their mother has gone for good.  They live on takeaways and crisps and the two older ones seem trapped in an uneasy no-man's and between childhood and adulthood.  What does it mean to be a parent, and what does it mean to be a child?  Can you be both at the same time?  At times they try to behave like parents to Finn, but don't know how to do it.  There's a birthday party, some sinister game-playing, and lots of claustrophobia, anguish and denial.  Polly Stenham's pitch-perfect ear for how teenagers speak is extraordinary, but the real virtues of this play lie elsewhere.  As in That Face, she shows a steely architectural sense of how to structure a two-act play and its individual scenes so that the story reaches a natural climax.  I only wish that Jez Butterworth's Parlour Song, the new play I saw at the Almeida last week, had the same virtues.  In fact I am beginning to think of quite a few more experienced playwrights who might do with taking a masterclass in structure from Miss Stenham.  David Hare might learn from her how to give Gethsemane a better ending, and might pick up a few tips on how to write more convincing lines for his teenage character.   The performances by Toby Regbo and Bel Powley as the teenage brother and sister are fantastic.  Hats off also to whichever young actor was playing Finn yesterday afternoon -- Finn Bennett or Austin Moulton.  If you get to read this, you will know whether it was you or not.  I think this play would work perfectly well on a bigger stage, but putting it in the smaller space of the Theatre Upstairs rather than in the main house isn't a reflection of lack of confidence in the material;  it's just a sensible way of lowering the pressure on a very inexperienced cast.  There isn't a false note anywhere in this two-hour production.  It's honest, funny, painful and true, and the product of a real theatrical mind at work.  Polly Stenham knows exactly how much to tell the audience and when to tell it;  she knows how to begin and end a scene, and how to avoid repetitious dialogue. Nicholas de Jongh please note. I don't want to spoil the plot for those who are lucky enough to get a ticket for the Royal Court to see this play, but the final scene when two adults join the children on stage is superbly written.  It reminded me of the beautifully engineered final scene in Coward's Private Lives.  The characters' story is unfinished, but the play is over and resolved -- a crucial distinction which escapes many writers.  If I was teaching drama to teenagers, I would be itching for the chance to stage Tusk Tusk in schools just as soon as it's licensed.