Review: Abigails Party, Naloxone Theatre Company, Friends Meeting House, York

4:57pm Friday 17th February 2012 By Charles Hutchinson WHAT happened in 1977? Elvis died; the Sex Pistols sneered; the Queen had one of her jubilees, and 16 million TV viewers sat open mouthed as Alison Steadman behaved appallingly in Mike Leighs caustic comedy Abigails Party. Director-producer Tom Wilsons Naloxone Theatre Company revive Leighs landmark living-room drama in a location new to your reviewer, the Friends Meeting House, a friendly place with a plate of chocolate drops on arrival. The seating is not raked, making the room more suited to a guest speaker, and so it is difficult to see more than the heads of the actors when they are seated. Nevertheless, that does not lessen the pleasure of watching Alana Dohertys blonde piranha Beverly chew up her guests in her maelstrom of endless gin top-ups, light ale, chain-smoked cigarettes and Jose Feliciano and Elvis records. It is not Abigails party that we are observing (although we hear the muffled punk music through the wall) but loud, aspiring Beverleys cheese-and-pineapple nibble soiree for her suburban North London neighbours. Workaholic husband Laurence (Simon Martin) is preoccupied/absent/stewing, exasperated by his witless wifes lack of appreciation for his tentative, self-improving interest in art. Their new neighbour, nurse Angela (Charlotte Hall, in her impressive professional debut), humorously grows ever more chatty the more pie-eyed she becomes. By contrast, humour bypasses taciturn ex-footballer Tony (Paul Bloomfield), who turns from brusque to brooding to breaking point. You can feel the excruciating discomfort of middle-class Sue (Helen Bailey), Abigails mum from next door, as Beverly pole-axes her by going on about her ex-husband. Playwright Leigh squeezes all the lemon juice out of a contemptuous comedy that grows ever more bitter and grotesque under Wilsons direction. Doherty, who exposes Beverlys shallow, lonely life behind the outrageous front, and Bloomfields snappy-as-a-Twiglet turn both deserve particular praise for stepping in to the production at only two weeks notice. Abigails Party, Naloxone Theatre Company, Friends Meeting House, Quaker Rooms, Friargate, York, tonight at 8pm; tomorrow at 3pm and 8pm. Tickets: available on the door. Back Copyright 2001-2012 Newsquest Media Group http://www.yorkpress.co.uk