The Gap (Jim Cartwright) - Hope Mill MCR

I was in two minds whether to and watch this but after reading the reviews and benny20 's positive post from his viewing a few days ago, I ended up getting a back row seat for today's performance and had a really good afternoon at Hope Mill. With a short run time of around 90 minutes (45 mins each Act plus a 20 min interval) time flew by watching Jim Cartwright's latest play and it certainly kept myself and the rest of the audience thoroughly entertained. Todays visit to HM to watch this was certainly a far more positive one than my last visit to watch "Head Over Heels". 

As a two hander production, both Matthew Kelly and Denise Welch make a great double act to watch having wonderful on stage chemistry as friends Walter and Corral. Kelly and Welch also play other side characters as well so there are plenty of quick costume changes in the play. In the play we watch as these two characters leave 1960's Manchester for the hustle and bustle of swinging 60's Soho and the ups and downs of their journey and the impact it has on both their lives over time. It really is a rags to riches and to rags again The whole piece is cleverly framed as retrospective look at their lives as an interview piece of a local paper in which the audience is brought into the play (and breaking the 4th wall) to act as the reporter to whom Walter and Corral tell their stories. In many respects, at times, particularly in Act 2 in which both Kelly and Welch get to deliver some wonderful, funny and sometimes rude monologues, it certainly felt a little like an Alan Bennett "Talking Heads" production.

Jim Cartwright doesn't shy away from looking at nostalgia, class and sex-work in the play and his wonderful dialogue has plenty of heart, humour (but with little emotional punch) that is brought brilliantly to life by these two actors in what is a fast paced play with snap shot scenes to show the passage of time that is aided by some lovely video projections onto moving panels and a nice sound design to help set the different scenes.