Theatre / Reviews
Review: Verbal Diary, The Mission Theatre, Bath – ‘Ragged around the edges, but warm-hearted’
When Gordon, the sad protagonist who needs to start a new life in a house-share, tells us he had “32 cheerios” for breakfast, we know we’re in Rik Mayall territory.
Verbal Diary was conceived back in 1984 by John Otway and Paul Bradley, who persuaded Mayall to underwrite a risky Edinburgh Fringe stint. They worked hard to get Mayall on board, it seems, and the show has a definite Young Ones and Bottom feel. Pun intended.
40 years after the show’s debut, in 2023, the comedian and actor Tom Johnson worked with Otway – they hit it off so well that Otway gave him carte blanche to revive and update the script, using his original songs (although not the famous one) as well as the Story Book set design which literally flips its pages to create bedrooms, the newspaper office, the pub, the bathroom and the garden. Clever use of flaps and hidden exits move us quickly back and forth between them.
We meet Gordon just after he loses his job, his house and his girlfriend, right before Christmas. So when learn that he has made two New Year’s resolutions – namely to keep a daily diary and to get off with house mate Cheryl – we root for him, in a forlornly hopeful way.
The other two housemates, performance poet Tristram and dodgy dealer Phil conspire with Cheryl to read Gordon’s diary, so they can track his days as he works as a photo-journalist for a local rag and haplessly tries to impress his editor and Cheryl in a series of gut-clenching failures.
There is plenty of weirdness, scatology and physical theatre – but in the midst of some bewildering material Gordon and Cheryl do make a connection, and the self-centred housemates display real affection for each other.
Despite the company’s obvious need to tighten up cues and hone the set pieces (we were told at the end that they hadn’t performed it for a long time) they work well together and find the warm heart at the centre of the show. Supported by two live musicians, we get the impression that they all have a good time together offstage.
Johnson has stayed faithful to so many of the show’s original cultural references – David Dickinson, Billy Bragg, print news, casual sexism – that you wonder what an audience of the under-60s will make of it.
Looking at the tour schedule, I’m guessing that John Otway fans, who are fiercely loyal, will be out in force.
Verbal Diary is on a UK tour until July 19. For more information, visit www.verbaldiaryshow.co.uk or follow @verbal_diary_show.
All photos: Film Free Photography
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