The Death of Arnold Balham

Girton will see the premier of two new works from award-winning playwright Gytha Lodge. Gytha, never one to typecast herself as a playwright, is offering two widely different tales, linked only by a rather dark brand of humour and a love of overturning expectations.

The Death of Arnold Balham is a late 20s murder-mystery, but one with a difference. We meet at its start three people decided on murder: the dominating but soon-to-be-divorced wife, the prickly, sarcastic Fabia and the hapless song-writer Lawrence. They want to kill for three very ordinary reasons. But the complex relationships of Sir Arnold and his family and a series of increasingly chaotic incidents begin to get in the way. It gradually becomes apparent that one of the three will become more of a victim than Arnold.

By turns comic, gripping and unsettling, The Death of Arnold has a lot to say about the fiction it mimics, while always going beyond it. Certain to be liked by murder mystery fanatics, and those who want something with more depth in their dramas.

Otherwise, the second play in the double-bill, has its mysteries as well, but these mysteries are a lot less straight-forward to untangle. The play opens with Harry Holland being interviewed in a police cell. It is the morning after a heavy night, one that Harry can’t quite remember. He isn’t sure what he’s done, but in re-telling the parts he can still recall, he tries desperately to control his account of events and ensure that he gets away with whatever he’s done. But his battle for control is doomed to failure as everything unravels, and he finds that he is fighting with his own memory for the life of the woman he loves.

Gytha is fresh from collecting the Geoffrey Whitworth Trophy, the prestigious prize awarded to the best new play from all the drama festivals across Britain each year. Her winning piece was The Funeral of Macie Loverett, also premiered in Girton. It was tagged as a play about “Death, relationships, feuding families, potato salad… and a bit more death.” A running theme, even across three such different plays?

“It isn’t just about death, and it certainly isn’t about gore,” Gytha says. “My last full-scale production achieved a body count of thirteen, but I deliberately kept six of those off-stage, and it was Renaissance Italy. Really, it’s just that I love taking characters and putting them into strange situations. Everything has been caused by people and their different aims, desires, frustrations and secrets. But the events end up controlling them in return, and it’s extremes and breaking-points that interest me the most. I always wonder what I would do if something horrific happened and I felt like I was to blame, or if someone betrayed me totally.”

Otherwise was first performed in Girton in October 2009. Early in 2010 it appeared at the Brighton fringe Festival, where it won the New Writing South Best New Play Award.

Playwright Gytha Lodge has won the first New Writing South Best New Play Award for OTHERWISE. This new annual award is in recognition of an outstanding new play premiered at the Brighton Festival Fringe.

Chris Taylor, Director, New Writing South says ‘OTHERWISE by Gytha Lodge was original, truly theatrical, and formally inventive - with a sensational “coup de theatre”. All the judges agreed it was a diamond.’

Gytha says ‘I'm absolutely delighted to receive this award. It's wonderful and rare for new writing to be judged and rewarded in this way, and the New Writing South mark goes a long way towards demonstrating quality.’

New Writing South and Brighton Fringe jointly designed the award to encourage more new plays in Brighton and to help promote quality, original pieces to the Fringe. The award differs from others in that it is given to a playwright for an outstanding play rather than to the production as a whole.

Almost 40 plays in the Brighton Fringe were judged by a panel of seven judges from New Writing South consisting of writers: Kefi Chadwick, Trevor Harvey, Kicking-K, Andrew G. Marshall, Josie Melia, Louise Monaghan and Chris Taylor.

From Fringe Guru, Catherine Meek says:

This is an excellent and ambitious production – and far better than its blurb suggests. On the face of it, this was not going to be original; the story is set in a police cell, and the main character, Harry, doesn’t remember why he’s there or what happened the night before. When the play opened with Harry sat opposite a police officer in interview, I anticipated the focus would be on the interview itself, maybe even as a vehicle for a statement on police powers. Wrong!

This is a story about Harry. That he ends up in a cell, accused of his girlfriend’s murder after a drunken night out, is not the point; the interview only provided a context for the story to unfold. In fact, this is a play about relationships. About friendships. About the people in our lives and the people we encounter, and how our perception of them often reflects our own desires or suspicions, needs and insecurities.

My attention was held throughout the 55 minutes, and this fact alone speaks loudly for both the story and the production – performed as it was in a hotel room in broad daylight, with only a table and chairs as props. The actors deftly moved these without causing distraction as the scene switched from cell to bar to restaurant to park bench. If the company had delivered the play less skilfully, the room would have been blatantly unsuitable; but on the contrary, I was right there in the cell, the bar, the restaurant, the park. It worked because the actors were at ease with their roles, achieving an interesting balance of being both separate from and intimate with the audience.

I have only one criticism: the actress playing Melissa changes part way through, and though this was a clever device I thought it was unnecessary. There is just no room for any query or incongruity in the time or space of this intense performance.

Overall though, this was an inspired performance. Its Brighton run is now over, but I recommend it thoroughly to anyone in Edinburgh this August.

Well done Guys and Gals, even if she did miss the point about changing actresses!