REVIEW: The Balance Of Friendships And Social Structures Are Challenged In Michael Frayn's BENEFACTORS

Wednesday 21st June 2023, 8pm, Ensemble Theatre

Almost 4 decades after BENEFACTORS premiered in 1984, Michael Frayn’s comic contemplation of the effect of an Architect’s solution to London’s housing crisis on his family and friends retains a relevance as human behavior with regards to giving and taking, supporting and surviving is eternal. Director Mark Kilmurry brings together a tight quartet to deliver this Laurence Olivier Award (1984, Best New Play) winning work which requires the audience to feel like the characters are frequently talking directly to them. 

Set in the 1960s, BENEFACTORS sees the impact that successful architect David’s (Gareth Davies) latest project, designing a new high density housing project to replace the now aging Victorian era terrace housing around Basuto Road, has on his home and social life when not everyone in his immediate circle are supportive of the proposed apartment tower.  Just as the project is pitched as being the answer to the prospective residents unsolicited needs, David and his anthropologist wife Jane (Emma Palmer) have also provided unasked for support to their neighbors, the former ‘golden boy’ journalist Colin (Matt Minto) and his subservient simpering wife Sheila (Megan Drury), though the pitfalls of their generosity have much more immediate and measurable impact than the potential residents of the proposed property.

With the work taking place entirely around David and Jane’s kitchen bench, Set and Costume designer Nick Fry’s choices for the wood veneer counter and exposed concrete wall and floor help anchor the work in the 1960’s with a brutalist design.  Fry’s costuming sets Jane as being more fashion forward with implied success and power with her solid purple dress and heels while Sheila is more of a stay-at-home housewife in comfortable cardigan and loafers.  David’s position as a architect engaged to create local authority housing is reinforced by the monochrome ‘traditional’ attire of knit vest and grey suit while former journalist Colin is more casually attired, deteriorating to double denim and slogan t-shirt. 

Frayn’s story oscillates between a memory of the lifecycle of the Basuto Road redevelopment, delivered through direct to audience monologues of the characters’ thoughts and memories, and flashbacks to 15 years prior from when David first bought home the map of Southeast London with the exited news that he’d landed the exciting project. Emma Palmer is captivating as the strong voice that sets the tone of the story that despite David’s childlike joy at the proposed project, there is a darker cloud that sits over the memory of the project’s evolution.  Her expression of Jane’s truth telling and skepticism is countered by Gareth Davies’ delivery of the calm but enthusiastic people pleaser David who is either naive or willfully ignorant of Colin and Sheila’s manipulation and exploitation.  Fueling the chaos in Jane and David’s world, Megan Drury and Matt Minto ensure that Sheila and Colin are significant characters in their extremes of personalities that disrupt their neighbor’s lives.  Drury and Minto express the couple as two unlikable characters, making it understandable why David and Jane don’t really like them but they are also both pathetic enough to justify the charity that the more successful couple show them. 

While the question around how to deal with housing shortages remains worldwide, the underlying message of BENEFACTORS sits with human behaviors on both a social and personal level.  It challenges audiences to consider how much we go out of our way to help others while also reminding us that friendships should be two-way streets with reciprocation at some point.  It also poses the idea that sometimes, as well intentioned an action or offer may be, is it really what is needed, or have we just assumed that we know what is best for others without consulting them.

https://www.ensemble.com.au/shows/benefactors/

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