• Review For Us
  • List Your Show
  • Advertising
  • Musicals
  • Plays
  • Ballet & Dance
  • Previews
  • First Look
Theatre Weekly
  • Home
  • News
    • West End
    • Off-West End
    • Regional & Tours
  • Reviews
  • Interviews
  • Digital Theatre
  • Tickets
    • Discounts
    • Musicals
    • Plays
    • Opera
    • Dance
    • Concerts
  • Edinburgh Fringe 2022
    • Edinburgh News
    • Edinburgh Previews
    • Edinburgh Interviews
    • Edinburgh Reviews
  • Contact Us
    • Join us as a Reviewer
No Result
View All Result
Theatre Weekly
  • Home
  • News
    • West End
    • Off-West End
    • Regional & Tours
  • Reviews
  • Interviews
  • Digital Theatre
  • Tickets
    • Discounts
    • Musicals
    • Plays
    • Opera
    • Dance
    • Concerts
  • Edinburgh Fringe 2022
    • Edinburgh News
    • Edinburgh Previews
    • Edinburgh Interviews
    • Edinburgh Reviews
  • Contact Us
    • Join us as a Reviewer
No Result
View All Result
Theatre Weekly
No Result
View All Result
Home Reviews
Paines Plough s HUNGRY by Chris Bush with Eleanor Sutton Melissa Lowe c The Other Richard

Paines Plough s HUNGRY by Chris Bush with Eleanor Sutton Melissa Lowe c The Other Richard

Review: Paines Plough’s Hungry at Soho Theatre

by Alexander Cohen
July 13, 2022
Reading Time: 3 mins read

Chris Bush is an ambitious playwright. Her three-play collection Rock/Paper/Scissors was performed across three stages at the same time to mark the Sheffield Crucible’s fiftieth anniversary earlier this year. Whilst her new play Hungry is not quite as grandiose in scale it still sizzles with ambition. But despite strong performances the play is overstuffed with themes. Perhaps the playwright has bitten off more than they can chew.

Anyone who has worked in a kitchen knows how suffocatingly intense they can be. An effervescent Eleanor Sutton translates this intensity of working kitchens to the stage as the franticly awkward chef Lori. She is loveable and charismatic, but her dorky charm is revealed to mask superciliousness; she wants to gentrify her waitress girlfriend Bex’s working class lifestyle. No more cheesy puffs, only tofu and wine. The ebbs and flows of their relationship are sliced and diced, served in non-chronological order, and pieced together one food orientated episode at a time.

The idea here is that food is the magnifying glass to reveal wider tensions about race, class, and social mobility, not just what it is but how it is eaten. It is certainly an interesting concept, but it feels unguided especially when it comes to the play’s often directionless moral compass.

       

Whilst Lori is pretentious, she recalls obnoxiously an anecdote about her first-time eating oysters whilst on holiday in France, she means no harm. Sutton’s performance is deeply compassionate, behind the skittish veneer is genuine affection; but Bush’s writing leaves Lori’s racist and classist microaggressions as undetermined and ambiguously motivated. But the audience condemn her regardless. They murmur disapprovingly at her suggestion of opening a restaurant serving “soul food”, appropriating cuisine from other cultures.

But any moral blame is offset by her naivety. Unfortunately, this goes undeveloped as meditations on grief, eating disorders, and relationships are also packed into the hour long run time. Whilst Bush is an undoubtedly talented playwright there are just too many ingredients thrown in for any flavours to flourish.

You mightalso like

Jodie Gilliam photo by Catherine Miller

Paines Plough Appoints Jodie Gilliam as Executive Director

Paines Plough Roundabout

Paines Plough announce Roundabout 2022 programme and Edinburgh Festival Fringe run

The lack of thematic development is not aided by the restless tone. Whilst brimming with energy, neither the dialogue nor the characters are ever given breathing room or time for reflection. Bex, played by an equally fiery Melissa Lowe, never diverts away from pouring searing vigour into every moment. Ferocity underlies every word she delivers to the point where the two are often playing an aggressive tennis match with each other armed with cutting words rather than racquets.

But the issue is that without tonal variation her protracted polemics are exhausting, especially in the intimate space of Soho Theatre’s upstairs stage. The questions that had previously lingered beneath the surface are thrown onto the table undigested in Hungry’s long monologues. Thankfully Katie Posner’s strong direction keeps the drama flowing. Her staging is sparse with Lowe and Sutton using two metal counters to slide back and forth between to mark new scenes. More poignantly it creates distance and intimacy between them as their relationship blossoms and wilts.

Paines Plough’s HUNGRY by Chris Bush will run at Soho Theatre until 30 July, before playing Roundabout in Summerhall at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe from 3-28 August. Full information can be found here.

Hungry Credit The Other Richard

1 of 4
- +
Paines Plough s HUNGRY by Chris Bush with Eleanor Sutton Melissa Lowe c The Other Richard
Paines Plough s HUNGRY by Chris Bush with Melissa Lowe c The Other Richard
Paines Plough s HUNGRY by Chris Bush with Eleanor Sutton c The Other Richard
Paines Plough s HUNGRY by Chris Bush with Eleanor Sutton Melissa Lowe c The Other Richard
ADVERTISEMENT

1. Paines Plough s HUNGRY by Chris Bush with Eleanor Sutton Melissa Lowe c The Other Richard

Paines Plough s HUNGRY by Chris Bush with Eleanor Sutton Melissa Lowe c The Other Richard

       

2. Paines Plough s HUNGRY by Chris Bush with Melissa Lowe c The Other Richard

Paines Plough s HUNGRY by Chris Bush with Melissa Lowe c The Other Richard

3. Paines Plough s HUNGRY by Chris Bush with Eleanor Sutton c The Other Richard

Paines Plough s HUNGRY by Chris Bush with Eleanor Sutton c The Other Richard

4. Paines Plough s HUNGRY by Chris Bush with Eleanor Sutton Melissa Lowe c The Other Richard

Paines Plough s HUNGRY by Chris Bush with Eleanor Sutton Melissa Lowe c The Other Richard

       
Alexander Cohen

Alexander Cohen

Alexander is a theatre and opera critic based in London.

Related Articles

Jodie Gilliam photo by Catherine Miller
News

Paines Plough Appoints Jodie Gilliam as Executive Director

Paines Plough Roundabout
Edinburgh Fringe 2022

Paines Plough announce Roundabout 2022 programme and Edinburgh Festival Fringe run

Stella Taylor
Interviews

Interview: Stella Taylor on Juniper and Jules at Soho Theatre

Bourgeois Maurice
Interviews

Interview: Bourgeois & Maurice on Pleasure Seekers at Soho Theatre

Laura Ford
Interviews

Interview: Laura Ford on LAVA at Soho Theatre

Paines Ploughs Roundabout Eleanor Sutton in Phoebe Eclair Powells Really Big and Really Loud c Marc Brenner
Digital

Paines Plough’s Family Show Really Big And Really Loud By Phoebe Eclair-Powell Available To Watch For Free This Easter

Twitter Facebook Youtube Instagram

At Theatre Weekly we give theatre a new audience. You'll find our theatre news, theatre reviews and theatre interviews are written from an audience point of view. Our great value London theatre tickets will get you the best deal for your theatre tickets.
Theatre Weekly, Kemp House, 152 - 160 City Road, London EC1V 2NX
  • Join Our Community
  • Privacy Policy
  • Cookie Policy
  • Terms and Conditions
  • Contact Us
  • Advertising

Recent News

She Wolf Credit Mihaela Bodlovic

Edinburgh Review: She Wolf at Assembly Roxy

An Evening Without Kate Bush courtesy of the Company

Edinburgh Review: An Evening Without Kate Bush at Assembly George Square Gardens

© 2020 Theatre Weekly

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Tickets
  • Digital Theatre
  • News
    • West End
    • Off West End
    • Regional & Tours
  • Reviews
  • Interviews
  • Edinburgh Fringe 2022
    • Edinburgh News
    • Edinburgh Previews
    • Edinburgh Interviews
    • Edinburgh Reviews
  • Contact Us
    • Join us as a Reviewer

© 2020 Theatre Weekly