The Beauty of Being Herd – Camden People’s Theatre

Writer: Ruth Berkoff

Director: Georgia Murphy

Sheep have it easy. All they need to do is bleat, eat and stick together, and Hannah decides they would make much better companions than the complicated humans she cannot seem to connect with in Ruth Berkoff’s adorable new show The Beauty of Being Herd. Playing for one night only at Camden People’s Theatre before heading to Glasgow, Brighton and Cardiff, this 60-minute existential one-sheep show has plenty of heart beneath the fluffy layers.

Staged as a goodbye party for Hannah, Berkoff’s show creates an instant audience rapport with the upfront confession that she is choosing to live as a sheep and quickly dresses in a costume prepared to blend in with her livestock community. It is an ice-breaker sequence that cleverly disarms an audience expecting a surreal transition from humanity to the herd, using plenty of sheep facts including the purpose of the tail, some songs and a number of audience games.

And Berkoff, performing as Hannah, works hard to maintain a level of silliness that entertains the viewer while ensuring her character takes the concept seriously. She asks someone in the front row to draw a little black nose, encourages everyone to call out with their own sheep noises and divides the crowd into four to perform the ‘rules’ of being a sheep, repeated throughout the show. Later there is a lesson on frolicking, a singalong and, eventually, as trust grows in the room a chance to shed pointless human worries as audience members let go of major anxieties like tangled hair, hubcaps and paying rent. Much of the time Berkoff seems astounded that a room of adult strangers are playing along with her show, yet they do.

Much of that is down to the equal degrees of charm and vulnerability that Berkoff builds into her character. Hannah’s plan is a surreal one, but it comes from a deep-rooted pain that sits underneath every scenario. This strand of urban loneliness and the inability to navigate all the unknowable rules of human interaction is bittersweet, as Hannah casts back to failed attempts to meet people by the lifts at work, at house parties and at a rave – vividly drawn scenarios that reveal the depth of the character’s isolation and the struggle to make true connection.

And there is genuine sadness in The Beauty of Being Herd, with a woman who leaves every conversation after 10 minutes, self-conscious that people want her to go. There could be a stronger story that expands on this thread, not just a throwaway comment about a childhood friendship that ended suddenly but more examples of why Hannah fears the intimacy of closer contact and perhaps sabotages opportunities to engage without realising it.

The sheep concept becomes less baffling as this context unfolds, reaching collective agreement that everyone feels like an outsider. And here the show suddenly stumbles, less clear how to conclude once Hannah finally finds commonality in the room. Instead, perhaps the show could end with a question, that having found a tribe, she may not need a herd.

Reviewed on 15 March and continues to tour