Review: BACON at Rogue Machine

Bacon is the West Coast premiere of a simmering new drama at Rogue Machine on Melrose running through March 30th.  Sinewy, raw, savagely intimate, Bacon is a spare two-person play by Sophie Swithinbank that grabs us hard and never lets us go, even for a second.

Mark and Darren first encounter each other at a London school when they are 15.  Darren is the homophobic tough kid, selling drugs for his alcoholic Irish dad who beats him.  Mark is the sweet, brainy fish out of water, the new Brazilian-English kid at school, not out, but obviously queer.  Their friendship, at first tinged with animosity, becomes closer over time, and the air between them is thick with sexual tension and something more transformative - the petal-like unfurling of profound new yearning.  

It feels like we know where this might be going, but in fact, we have no idea.  Bacon explores bullying, homophobia, adolescence, queer desire, the longing for closeness — and doing everything you can to destroy it.  Writing by Sophie Swithinbank and direction by Michael Matthews are fearless, transgressive, ferociously intense.  

I do not want to spoil any of the revelations of this shocking drama.  It is an electrically charged, dangerous live wire act.  There are scenes of domestic violence, sexual violence, intimate partner violence, and self harm.  There are moments I wanted to bolt out of the intimate upstairs Attic Theatre at Rogue Machine, just to get away from the almost unbearable intensity of the performances by Jack Lancaster and Wesley Guimarães.  I felt more than moved by the brilliant performances in this play. I felt shattered.  There is something harrowing about being completely saturated in the kind of abuse that cloaks itself irresistibly in intimacy.    

In fact Bacon feels so real, so immersive in the upstairs theatre, the rather magical Henry Murray Stage, that at times I felt like an accomplice, voyeuristic and guilty for not stopping the abuse I was witnessing a mere several feet away from me.  

I have seen the Henry Murray Stage at Rogue Machine transformed believably into a Nazi bunker and a rehab facility, and each time, if I had not gone up the same stairs, I would swear I was in a completely different space.  The superlative creative crew at Rogue Machine consistently works miracles here.  I love the eccentric slanted walls and offbeat intimacy of this unusual space, now a London cafe with warm red brick walls, cozy blackboards, and the tantalizing smells of coffee and cooking.  Production design for Bacon by Stephen Gifford is superb.

There are times it feels like there may be excessive use of narration in the writing.  I also intensely dislike the use of imaginary props, but then, once Mark and Darren steal and ride a bicycle and interact with a dog, I understand that choice.  Impressively, Bacon does avoid one of the things that I find most grating, since grinding my teeth through bad accent work is one of my least favorite pastimes.  The accent work in Bacon is pretty flawless, down to the specificity of the region and class of the characters, with supremely accomplished work from the actors Jack Lancaster and Wesley Guimarães and dialect coach Tuffet Schmelzle.

Bacon is unforgettable.

To post a comment, you must register and login.