Writer: Abigail Hood
Director: Kevin Tomlinson
From start to finish, there is not a character that walks across the stage who doesn’t suffer or bear the suffering of a loved one. Casey Grey would literally do anything for the love of her life, Zoe Douglas—both just 15 years old. She winds up doing the unthinkable, as Zoe bears witness. Monster puts the most sensitive possible subjects in a pot, leaving it all to boil over, leaving the audience to squirm in their seats and grapple with their own qualms towards guilt and penance.
The stage walls, chaotically wrapped in newspapers, each with big headlines all stating different things, but the most visible ones often on harder-to-broach topics. Building the set are items you’d sooner see at a demolition/construction site: Turned-over and cracked cones and traffic barriers, cement blocks stacked thigh high, half a bathtub filled with license plates, a tyre swing, and a huge corrugated tube—a favourite hiding spot of Casey’s.
Despite the cacophonous slew of things that make up this set, the six actors who inhabit the space are able to morph the threshold into their homes, a beach, a home for assisted living, even a graveyard at two points in the show. The transitions are never in full blackout until the very end of Act One, which allows for the space to be configured by the actors rather than set pieces. Though the quick on and off of the songs during these transitions leaves you feeling pulled through the plot rather than drawing you into the next scene.
The cluttered heap of construction refuse acts as a third space for these girls—Casey and Zoe. Not school, not home, a safe middle ground where they can speak freely, where they live out their fantasies. Casey, played by Abigail Hood, and Zoe, by Lauren Downie, stand as opposites that attract. Zoe, a soft, kindhearted girl, often gets picked on by others at school—who’ll follow Casey’s every word. Casey is a more sort of wild child, who grew up abused and mistreated by her mother, played by Sara Waddell. Her upbringing leads her to defend Zoe at any cost, going so far as to take the punishment of Zoe’s bullies into her own hands. The youthful playfulness of those two actors is contrasted by schoolteacher Rebecca Hastie (Lisa Ellis). Despite suffering a first-hand experience with one of Casey’s fits of rage, she is able to look past herself and try to understand rather than reprimand the young girl.
With Act Two taking a 12-year bound forward in time, you’re taken alongside the characters as they try to compartmentalise, unpack, or just run from the events of their pasts. You’ll be reeling after Act One, and hoping more than before that everyone ends up alright in the end. The script does not practice much ambiguity allowing you to draw your own conclusions. Instead, you’re told plainly the extent to which each character has suffered and will continue to suffer and why.
Monster puts on stage before you the very real weight of mistakes and the guilt that follows, taking it to the extreme in this case of this story. Intense and emotional, you might feel heavier walking out. You feel inspired to reconnect with someone you’ve wronged or feel it’s time to let go of the contempt you still hold for that one person.
Runs until 18 October 2025
