Paradise Now! – Bush Theatre, London

Writer: Margaret Perry

Director: Jaz Woodcock-Stewart

Gabriel (Michele Moran), recovering from a depression which saw her unable to focus on anything other than the Kardashians, finds herself in a women’s leadership event, where Shazia Nicholls’s Alex persuades her to join her as a sales rep for Paradise, maker and sellers of essential oils.

The Paradise “fempire” (led by a “She-E-O”) promises independence, control and power for the self-employed women who sign up and shell out £250 for the starter pack. Anyone who recruits a new team member gets a commission from their downline sales – which means that it’s more profitable to get people to sign up than it is actually to sell the products.

In other words, it’s a multilevel marketing scheme of the sort where overpriced luxury goods are the hook and, in the case of Paradise, a variety of vulnerable women are the bait. As well as Gabriel, Paradise scoops up influencer Carla (Ayoola Smart), much to the chagrin of her girlfriend Anthie (Annabel Baldwin). But when a Facebook message ensnares Laurie, one of Alex’s old schoolmates, it becomes clear that all is not well in Paradise.

Rakhee Thakrar’s chaotic, charismatic energy as Laurie propels what initially feels as rigid and clean as Rosie Elnile’s beech veneer set into something wilder and altogether more unpredictable – something which, to the play’s credit, the set goes on to echo, through a gradual reveal of hidden compartments and even a water feature.

As the women progress deeper into the world of Paradise – absolutely not a cult, Alex insists, not entirely convincingly – the fervour takes hold. Moran’s depiction of a woman who has found a sense of purpose and will do anything to come out on top is nuanced and subtle; Nicholls, meanwhile, impresses as an ambitious woman who feels she has to exploit her panic attacks, and the oils’ ability to get her to refocus, in the name of greater sales.

Margaret Perry’s script is clearly critical of MLM schemes, and rightly so, but it does highlight the strengths that the women find in each other. But such pyramid selling is also damaging: in a scene which is too on-the-nose to be metaphorical, a team-building exercise sees the women attempt to build a human pyramid, with Moran’s high-selling Gabriel at the top.

Everything collapses, and people – especially Thrakrar’s Laurie – get hurt. The promise of success for all, when the money ultimately only flows upward to Paradise’s American leadership, is hollow and unachievable. But in dramatising this group of women’s rise and fall, in deconstructing faux-feminist capitalism, Perry crafts a tale that takes the premise of multilevel marketing and creates something that a pyramid structure cannot: satisfaction for all.

Continues until 21 January 2023