Mojo the Play

With endless good reviews boasting an all-star cast, a classic script by Jez Butterworth and a charismatic venue, 'Mojo' was a play I was extremely excited to go and see. I can say, for the sake of at least 3 of the cast members reputation in my head, I wish I hadn't.

It takes a lot for me to walk away from a play with bad feeling or disappointment. 'Mojo' was this play for me. Perhaps it was the 50s era that neither me nor my boyfriend have ever experienced. Or maybe it was the high expectation that came with the all-star cast I have learned to love on screen. Or possibly it could be the fact I felt a little under the weather and bought standing tickets for £10 - OR it could just have been awful. It's disappointing that a cast of such talent is selling out night after night, when I feel that they don't really deserve it.

Regardless of whether it was down to tiredness from the earlier matinee, or the fact it may have just been an 'off-day' I began to steadily wonder at the wisdom of all the critics. The characters seemed not to have any genuine rapport either as actors, nor as the off-your-face so-called gangsters they were supposed to be. The 'Cockney' accents were at some times forced and lines often a little expressionless for a group of rock-n-roll bandits that would surely bound together in a crisis such as the one they find themselves in.

So who really has their Mojo?

The play is set in a dodgy drug-filledclub in 1950s Soho and begins on a very important night for the business - with owner of the club, Ezra in a meeting with the terrifying Mr Ross to barter for the young new talent of Silver Johnny. Although we never meet either Ezra or Mr Ross, Sid (Daniel Mays) and Sweets (Rupert Grint) let their gurning cockney jaws loose in an attempt to reveal the status and fear that these men are held in. I have to say, that the attempt at helping us out with the invisible men was useful as the automated telephone options on the line to HMRC - useless. Although it was comedic to see Sid run around stretching his legs too far from his body, I still couldn't work out which one between Ezra and Ross, was the owner of the club, amidst the drug-fuelled nonsense they were speaking. The whole play takes a horrid turn when the body of Ezra is discovered by second-in-command Mickey (Brendan Coyle) in two separate dustbins out-back. Ezra's son 'Baby' then goes (more) off-the-rails, seeks out Mr Ross who is keeping Johnny Silver hidden and uncovers that in fact, Mickey killed Ezra to get ownership of the club. Baby then strings up Silver by his feet, shoots 'Skinny' and we watch as Sid and Sweets escape out back and Mickey...falls over?

Subtle physicality just doesn't work!
PHOTO: Alastair Muir: 

It sounds eventful, but truly, the events were so staggered, or more accurately (the actors staggered through it), that I failed to even care that Skinny died. Perhaps it was after a short break in the performance due to a technical hitch that I assume was to do with the mechanism holding Silver upside down? (Although looking back it might have added entertainment). I applaud the fact that I barely remember this break due to the professionalism of the actors however, soon it was overshadowed by the fact I failed to understand exactly what happened to Mickey, after he took a kick to the stomach from Sid, fell to the floor and never got up. Did he die, did he pass out or was it just some feeble attempt at a symbolic still image?

Mickey was an all round disappointment for me. It's hard for me to come to terms with the fact that perhaps Downton's 'Mr Bates' is adept for the screen but quite frankly, god-awful onstage. His subtle facial expressions may work when a camera is inches from his face but will never conquer an audience sitting three balconies away. He also seemed a little miscast. His character boasted the need for physical presence, for inducing fear and presenting a confidence and status that shakes an audience. Brendan Coyle is not this person. He is more adept at playing the silent and strong type with a quivering lip than he is as a terrifying gangster with weight. If he had sat down and whispered his lines whilst reading them directly from the script he would have been just as convincing. In fact, in terms of his performance, the image below is a great example. He is so wooden and rigid he looks as though a large pole has just infiltrated his nether regions. Ben Whishaw as 'Baby' carries him along the final scenes whilst the other characters represent the perplexed expression I held on my face for most of the performance.

Does Bates have a pole up there or something?

Moving on to Rupert Grint's character, 'Sweets' was carried slightly by his saviour of a companion Sid. Grint struggled to always uphold the energy needed for stage whereas Daniel Mays took it all in his stride. For his stage debut, Grint wasn't all bad but I feel that perhaps without the energy of Sid, we may as well have treated ourselves to some misdirected nativity play for free at the local church. Sweets also has many lines which are written to be interrupted. At these times, it is exceedingly unnatural to hear a character stop abruptly without cause and I only wish he had been directed to fill in the gaps in case he is not interrupted immediately - or at least gone the extra mile t figure that out for himself. Homework won't happen magically anymore Ron! Joking aside, we  enjoy the fact that he has now emerged from the cobwebs of Hogwarts into a world where bad language and illegal substances exist. He seems to thrive upon it too. I just wish that he'd notice he no longer has to hide in Harry Potter's shadow and that he is an actor in his own right. I fear he will only ever be a side-kick.

Mays & Grint in action

Mays (Sid) truly shone amongst the all-star cast. He took over the stage with physicality and enthusiasm, demanding our attention at all times with both actions and words - A particular favourite phrase: 'polite young ladies come their cocoa in public'. He brought the no-shame, jabbering, uninhibited thoughts of Sid to light as though they were his own filthy realisations. His characterisation seemed more fulfilling than the others alongside him. Almost as if he was the only character to have actually done his homework into how to make an audience laugh. 

Whishaw Showing His Moves

It is unfair to say that Mays was the only success. Ben Whishaw not only drew attention to the fact he has a bloody good singing voice, nor to the fact he works out - a lot but also to the reason I fell in love with him in 'The Hour'. He is another actor set to go far. He dominated the stage even when we weren't entirely sure what he was talking about. His unpredictable nature became one of the only things to keep me interested beyond holding my own eyelids open. It truly reflected how his character 'Baby' was unhinged both by the amount of amphetamines in his system and the death of his father. For example, the scene pictured left shows him dancing around insanely. The next scene sees him hold a gun to his friends' faces and hang a boy in silver trousers upside down!

The set provided a little interest with the upstairs of the club represented for the first half of the performance and the lower sequinned walls of the downstairs dance-floor and bar in the second. Perhaps it was better that I got to sit down from my standing position in the second half as I wasn't entirely sure if the rest of the production was making me queasy, or whether it was the height we were stood at. The production sets out to represent an era of amphetamines and rock n roll. I suppose it succeeds because I am still not entirely sure what the characters were talking about for the majority of the time what with their mockney accents and - surprisingly - scripted nonsense. The actors themselves need no introduction, but perhaps they need a little more rehearsal. Character workshops, physicality, expression: all things they would have benefited from (Mays and Whishaw aside). 

I was thoroughly excited for the show, being both a fan of theatre and of the cast but I came out never having been so happy that I only spent a tenner! It was just empty of character. Utterly bursting with weary worn-away words and halted movement. It took most of my energy to just stay awake, feeling slightly under the weather, which meant that any hope of following the whole play was impossible. To conclude, I've no idea which play all the other critics are watching, but it most certainly isn't the same one we saw. There was nothing that stood out for me. I pick out Mays performance as the class-act, but there was nothing to compete. It's been a long time since I felt nothing for a production, but on this freezing cold November night, I would rather have spent time strolling around icy London squares eating ice-cream to elongate the icicles on my nose and contemplating a possible relationship break-down, than attempt to fathom entertainment from Mojo's so-called all-star cast.

Mojo? - they most certainly did not have. 

4/10
I advise you not to spend more than the £10-15 tickets available. I don't know how they will ever justify the tickets they sell for £85!


Take a look at these misguided reviews for another opinion:
http://londonist.com/2013/11/mojo-gripping-from-start-to-finish.php?showpage=2#gallery-1
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/theatre/theatre-reviews/10446422/Mojo-Harold-Pinter-Theatre-review.html

and the only review that I believe has any remaining sanity: http://www.express.co.uk/entertainment/theatre/442988/Mojo-at-the-Harold-Pinter-Theatre-review