Review Roundup: TICKING Starring Tom Hughes, Niamh Cusack and Anthony Head

BAFTA nominated writer and director Paul Andrew Williams made his theatre debut with original play Ticking which opened at London's Trafalgar Studios on the 6th October for a five week run.

Let's see what the critics had to say:

Holly Williams, WhatsOnStage: The writing veers between cool construction and histrionic outbursts, trips down memory lane spiked with pitched accusations. There are also nice, perceptive details in Williams' writing that make the set-up believable: Simon's near-org*smic enjoyment of a Twix bar, or the moment when his mother cries into rough prison handtowels, because she's already run out of tissues. But overall, Ticking feels like an exercise in cynicism. The high-stakes scenario that enables a final brutally honest showdown is also one that would surely allow resentments to melt away into forgiveness.

Henry Hitchings, Evening Standard: Tom Hughes, recently so good in TV spy thriller The Game, is fidgety and combative as Simon. Energy convulses his body as he paces furiously and flings a last supper of baked beans against the wall of his grubby cell.

Alice Saville, Time Out: Some shows make you clock-watch with the desperation of Bart Simpson, his eyes glued to an elastic second hand as he languishes in school detention. This turgid new play from writer and director Paul Andrew Williams is one of them, detaining us on a Chinese death row with a rich white kid who's so astonishingly obnoxious that it's hard not to will the hour of his demise forward.

Quentin Letts, Daily Mail: ...But I am afraid I disliked this show. So much of it is violent - and violently overacted by Tom Hughes as Simon. He is a good-looking boy but could we please do with rather less of the drama school eye-shuttering to convey anger. Cliches abound. Simon, fond of his mother, has sex-related 'issues' with his father. Simon's last supper arrives - beans on toast and a pint of stout. 'Bet that plate of beans ends up being smashed against the wall in anger,' said I to myself. Sure enough...

Ann Treneman, The Times: On the whole, I am not sure that I wanted to spend 90 minutes in a room with the subject of capital punishment. But that was my error. This new play by the film writer and director, Paul Andrew Williams, is not really about the death penalty but about the secrets, lies and loves of one very small family.

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