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The Good Person of Szechwan – Lyric Hammersmith Theatre, London

Reviewer: Karl O’Doherty

Writer: Bertolt Brecht

Translator: Nina Segal

Director: Anthony Lau

As unanswerable questions go, this one’s a doozy. The Good Person of Szechwan asks where the sweet spot is when balancing your own interests and those of others if you want to be “good.”

The polychromatic production is a new version of Bertolt Brecht’s 1940s rumination on the nature of capitalism and altruism. It was commissioned by English Touring Theatre and co-produced in a nice collaboration between the ETT, Sheffield Theatres (where it has already been well received at the Sheffield Crucible) and Lyric Hammersmith Theatre. This collaborative spirit carries through into the actual production. As a team, writer Nina Segal, director Anthony Lau and designer Georgia Lowe deliver a beautifully constructed world on stage where a rippling, colourful sheen overlays a deeply thoughtful quasi-parable about a search for “goodness”.

Acting as host and tour guide for the story is Wang (a nuanced and warming performance by Leo Wan), a waterseller in the city. He encounters three Gods (not to be confused with the main God God) on a quest to find a person who meets their confusing and subjective definition of “good” in order to prove they shouldn’t destroy earth, and also to find accommodation for the night. Wang introduces them to his friend, the sex-worker Shen Te (in a smashing role for Ami Tredrea) who gives them a room and shows them gracious hospitality. Their $1000 reward for this sets in motion a push/pull where she tastes success, struggles with wanting to be generous but also keep a roof over her head, encounters the greed of her neighbours and callousness of a man she falls in love with, faces utter ruin financially and counteracts this by creating a male alter-ego to stand up for herself and nearly causes her moral destruction.

Helped by some curious karaoke style musical numbers, the energy and weirdness of it all, as well as the gaudiness of the design, unbalances us and keeps us thinking. Characters enter and leave the stage through ball-pools, through porous stage walls made from hundreds of white floaty rods and via two large hot-pink ramps. And then there’s the startling theme of cigarettes throughout (Shen Te buys a tobacco shop with her windfall that soon becomes a distressing tobacco factory rife with unsafe conditions and worker exploitation). Among the exploration of wealth, capitalism and the nature of goodness we’re hit with striking illustrations of sexism, abuse, guilt and other hearty themes. All this while delivering genuine belly laughs throughout. Truly, we’re spoiled.

It’s all very rich. It generously gives the audience a surfeit of colour and ideas and great performances and humour and pathos. By the end, with so much to have taken in the final message is difficult to absorb and appreciate. The journey is wildly enjoyable, and provides much to reflect on, but it leaves us exhausted by the time we get to the destination, doing itself a disservice.

Runs until 13 May 2023

The Reviews Hub Score

Vibrant and thoughtful

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The Reviews Hub London is under the editorship of Richard Maguire. The Reviews Hub was set up in 2007. Our mission is to provide the most in-depth, nationwide arts coverage online.

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