‘I am not your punch bag! I am a Member of Parliament!’
An MP with an instinct for compassion. An ex-serviceman with a life in free fall. And a parliamentary protection officer who’s having none of it.
This volatile new play stars BAFTA Award winner Anna Maxwell Martin (Motherland, Line of Duty) as a hard-working opposition backbencher whose ideals of public office are tested by the demands of a man in crisis, played by Tony, BAFTA and Emmy Award winner James Corden (One Man, Two Guvnors, The History Boys).
Directed by Olivier and Tony Award winner Matthew Warchus (A Christmas Carol, Matilda The Musical) and written by Olivier Award winner Joe Penhall (Blue/Orange, Mood Music), The Constituent deconstructs politics, panic alarms and the conflict between public service and personal safety.
__Assisted Performances:__
BSL, 23 Jul, 7:30pm
Captioned, 26 Jul, 7:30pm
Relaxed, (Audio Described, BSL & Captioned) 27 Jul, 2:30pm
Audio Described, Wed 31 Jul, 7:30pm
Matthew Warchus’s combative traverse staging, with a bank of the audience seated onstage, works a treat, creating a claustrophobic intensity and forcing us to look at ourselves – we are responsible here too. The scene changes could be much shorter though, especially in such a taut 90-minute piece. In a cynical world, Penhall’s play is notable for its empathy – a quality that Monica strives for, and which is baked into the show at a fundamental level. Fixing our system so that it supports everyone, including genuinely good MPs? That gets my vote.
Corden is outstanding, however, and the manic energy that turbo charged the comedy of One Man is here repurposed in a more dramatic context. You can feel his anger simmering even in some of the more comic interchanges, and Maxwell Martin responds with the cool wariness of someone who wants to do the right thing for a man who behaves like a human IED.
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