Miriam Gillinson
posted 7 November 2007

The Menier Chocolate Factory has been transformed into Hell’s Kitchen with Patrick Marber concocting the tasty, if slightly unsatisfying dish ‘Dealer’s Choice’. Setting the play entirely in a restaurant and its ‘backstage’ kitchen, Marber uses a high-stakes game of poker to analyse and expose the strengths and weaknesses of the restaurant’s staff and customers: who has the upper hand when the chips are down and the cooks off-duty.

In the programme notes, Marber explains ‘the play…expressed the difficulty of being a son. Now it strikes me as a play about the complexities of being a father.’ This might have been his intention, but because of a slightly uneven structure and certain characters sparkling more than others (in particular Steven Wight’s delightfully naive Mugsy), this show proves a chance to marvel at Marber’s wit and Samuel West’s assured (sometimes too assured) directing, rather than reflect on the finer complexities of the father-son relationship.

Tom Piper’s set is a good one: a gleaming white kitchen dwarfs backstage, with the restaurant’s tables spilling into the Menier audience. We share the stage’s space and as the audience files in, the smell of chef Sweeney’s (Ross Boatman) diced onions seeps into the crowd. This enclosed set-up suggests a level of audience implication and involvement, which is never quite met. Instead, thanks to Marber’s sparky script and some uneven acting, we are slightly distanced from the piece and it is the comic elements that steal the show. Steven Wight as Mugsy is the star here, which is no surprise considering he played an extremely similar role in Marber’s recent Don Juan in Soho. It is still great casting though: Wight has the perfect face, voice, spirit to play the hapless, but loveable waiter Mugsy, and his scenes with boss Stephen had the rather reserved Menier crowd openly chuckling:

‘Mugsy: Was there much history of death in the family?
Stephen: Yes, it’s been a recurrent problem.’

With one-liners like these most credit must go to Marber, though Wight times his delivery like a pro. Where the play falls down is when the stakes are raised and emotions called into play. It all becomes a little soap opera and not quite tight or real enough to invest in. Stephen holds all the cards here (apologies) – but though Malcolm Sinclair puts in a commanding performance, it is one that never quite reaches his eyes. It is Stephen’s relationships with son Carl (Samuel Barnett) and surrogate son/employee Mugsy that should generate the emotion, but it’s somehow lost beneath the production’s flashier, wittier moments. By the time the play gets round to saying something serious, the audience have fallen for Marber’s wit and Mugsy’s charm and are reluctant for the spell to be broken. The script sags underneath the sentiment – and in a final showdown Ash (played with a lot of panache, but a little too much enigma by Roger Lloyd Pack) has to deliver a real clanger: ‘Bit like aces, kids, I suppose. You fall in love with them, you can’t pass…’ Heavy handed lines like these suggest that the play’s central metaphor doesn’t quite hold up – and is prone to flagging at vital moments.

Samuel West takes a strong line on the play’s tone, choosing to package it as thumping entertainment, rather than a more subtle beast with wider truths to tell. Everything about his production is colourful and loud, with a keen sense of fun; the pumping music he threads through the production and the expansive performances he encourages from his actors keep the audience wide awake, if not particularly moved.

Till 17 November 2007, then opening at Trafalgar Studios 1 on December 6.