The Harmony Test - Hampstead Downstairs

[Steve]

Saw this earlier tonight and LOVED it, and so did 3 others, so it isn't just me, I promise lol.

This is about having kids, how to sustain a relationship if you're struggling to have one (its called "The Harmony Test," so you know things won't be smooth sailing), and how to sustain a relationship when the kids are leaving home, as well.

So far, so boring.

But no, this is pure entertainment. The writing by Richard Molloy is SO funny one moment, and immensely dramatically involving a moment later.

For a tiny theatre, like Hampstead Downstairs, to have recruited both Jemima Rooper and Pearl Chanda to the cast, two awesome actors who rarely put a foot wrong, is no coincidence, as all the characters really pop.

Some spoilers follow. . .

Pearl Chanda's Zoe really wants a baby and is policing her husband, Bally Gill's Kash, to get one. Meanwhile, her older friend, Jemima Rooper's Naomi's own daughter is leaving the nest, she's tired of her husband, Miles Twomey's Charlie, and now she's super-interested in new gym buddy, Sandro Rosta's Rocco instead.

There is an explosion of outrageous breaking-free comedy from Rooper, who reckons "toddlers are c--ts" and can't take her eyes off Rosta.

There is an explosion of Alpha Man Vs Beta Man comedy with Sandro Rosta's Alpha constantly reducing Bally Gill's Beta into a puddle of insecurity.

There is also some magnificent drunken "I've had it up to here" comedy from Miles Twomey, when his wife's moves prove too much.

There is some gorgeously realised "Are you actually my husband!" comedy from Pearl Chanda when her husband finds a novel way of enhancing their fertility prospects.

All the above get above average laughs.

And yet, since all the comedy is based on real feeling characters reacting authentically, rather than comic exaggeration, there is room too for some marvellous dramatic twists and turns that get into seriously poignant, affecting and difficult territory.

Chanda is the soul of the piece, utterly relatable and affecting. Rooper is the principal catalyst for comedy, with some belly laugh level outbursts. The whole cast, though, are wonderful.

And there is one visually arresting Alpha man Vs Beta man moment that had me unable to stop laughing.

Its to Alice Hamilton's credit that she is able to blend comedy and drama with such authenticity. (Her "The March on Russia" remains one of the most satisfying productions I ever saw at The Orange Tree Theatre).

Anyway, the material, about conception and rocky relationships, is undoubtedly much trodden, yawn-inducing territory, which TV sitcoms plough day in and day out, but here the humour and drama just feel so fresh.

This is the best show I've seen at the Downstairs venue in a while, so I'd give it 4 stars.

[showgirl]

Glad to read this, Steve, as I'd booked for the Saturday matinee so was really peeved to find, as so often, that it turned out to be advertised as 1 h 35, straight through, ie not nearly filling a normal matinee slot so potentially leaving an awkward gap to fill afterwards. I'd decided to go anyway & fortunately then found an early evening film to follow but in view of your comments, I'm actually looking forward to this now. PN is tonight (Thursday 23).

[barelyathletic]

May 22, 2024 22:50:40 GMT Steve said:

Saw this earlier tonight and LOVED it, and so did 3 others, so it isn't just me, I promise lol.

This is about having kids, how to sustain a relationship if you're struggling to have one (its called "The Harmony Test," so you know things won't be smooth sailing), and how to sustain a relationship when the kids are leaving home, as well.

So far, so boring.

But no, this is pure entertainment. The writing by Richard Molloy is SO funny one moment, and immensely dramatically involving a moment later.

For a tiny theatre, like Hampstead Downstairs, to have recruited both Jemima Rooper and Pearl Chanda to the cast, two awesome actors who rarely put a foot wrong, is no coincidence, as all the characters really pop.

Some spoilers follow. . .

Pearl Chanda's Zoe really wants a baby and is policing her husband, Bally Gill's Kash, to get one. Meanwhile, her older friend, Jemima Rooper's Naomi's own daughter is leaving the nest, she's tired of her husband, Miles Twomey's Charlie, and now she's super-interested in new gym buddy, Sandro Rosta's Rocco instead.

There is an explosion of outrageous breaking-free comedy from Rooper, who reckons "toddlers are c--ts" and can't take her eyes off Rosta.

There is an explosion of Alpha Man Vs Beta Man comedy with Sandro Rosta's Alpha constantly reducing Bally Gill's Beta into a puddle of insecurity.

There is also some magnificent drunken "I've had it up to here" comedy from Miles Twomey, when his wife's moves prove too much.

There is some gorgeously realised "Are you actually my husband!" comedy from Pearl Chanda when her husband finds a novel way of enhancing their fertility prospects.

All the above get above average laughs.

And yet, since all the comedy is based on real feeling characters reacting authentically, rather than comic exaggeration, there is room too for some marvellous dramatic twists and turns that get into seriously poignant, affecting and difficult territory.

Chanda is the soul of the piece, utterly relatable and affecting. Rooper is the principal catalyst for comedy, with some belly laugh level outbursts. The whole cast, though, are wonderful.

And there is one visually arresting Alpha man Vs Beta man moment that had me unable to stop laughing.

Its to Alice Hamilton's credit that she is able to blend comedy and drama with such authenticity. (Her "The March on Russia" remains one of the most satisfying productions I ever saw at The Orange Tree Theatre).

Anyway, the material, about conception and rocky relationships, is undoubtedly much trodden, yawn-inducing territory, which TV sitcoms plough day in and day out, but here the humour and drama just feel so fresh.

This is the best show I've seen at the Downstairs venue in a while, so I'd give it 4 stars.

[barelyathletic]

May 23, 2024 12:00:38 GMT barelyathletic said:

May 22, 2024 22:50:40 GMT Steve said:

Saw this earlier tonight and LOVED it, and so did 3 others, so it isn't just me, I promise lol.

This is about having kids, how to sustain a relationship if you're struggling to have one (its called "The Harmony Test," so you know things won't be smooth sailing), and how to sustain a relationship when the kids are leaving home, as well.

So far, so boring.

But no, this is pure entertainment. The writing by Richard Molloy is SO funny one moment, and immensely dramatically involving a moment later.

For a tiny theatre, like Hampstead Downstairs, to have recruited both Jemima Rooper and Pearl Chanda to the cast, two awesome actors who rarely put a foot wrong, is no coincidence, as all the characters really pop.

Some spoilers follow. . .

Pearl Chanda's Zoe really wants a baby and is policing her husband, Bally Gill's Kash, to get one. Meanwhile, her older friend, Jemima Rooper's Naomi's own daughter is leaving the nest, she's tired of her husband, Miles Twomey's Charlie, and now she's super-interested in new gym buddy, Sandro Rosta's Rocco instead.

There is an explosion of outrageous breaking-free comedy from Rooper, who reckons "toddlers are c--ts" and can't take her eyes off Rosta.

There is an explosion of Alpha Man Vs Beta Man comedy with Sandro Rosta's Alpha constantly reducing Bally Gill's Beta into a puddle of insecurity.

There is also some magnificent drunken "I've had it up to here" comedy from Miles Twomey, when his wife's moves prove too much.

There is some gorgeously realised "Are you actually my husband!" comedy from Pearl Chanda when her husband finds a novel way of enhancing their fertility prospects.

All the above get above average laughs.

And yet, since all the comedy is based on real feeling characters reacting authentically, rather than comic exaggeration, there is room too for some marvellous dramatic twists and turns that get into seriously poignant, affecting and difficult territory.

Chanda is the soul of the piece, utterly relatable and affecting. Rooper is the principal catalyst for comedy, with some belly laugh level outbursts. The whole cast, though, are wonderful.

And there is one visually arresting Alpha man Vs Beta man moment that had me unable to stop laughing.

Its to Alice Hamilton's credit that she is able to blend comedy and drama with such authenticity. (Her "The March on Russia" remains one of the most satisfying productions I ever saw at The Orange Tree Theatre).

Anyway, the material, about conception and rocky relationships, is undoubtedly much trodden, yawn-inducing territory, which TV sitcoms plough day in and day out, but here the humour and drama just feel so fresh.

This is the best show I've seen at the Downstairs venue in a while, so I'd give it 4 stars.

[barelyathletic]

Gah! Seem to be going slightly doolally with my response here. Just wanted to say thanks for the great review. I'd missed this entirely and it sounds excellent. Have booked now. It's selling well too.

[joem]

Thought this was very good. Went to see it on the basis of Jemima Rooper but this was a fine ensemble cast doing a younger Ayckbourn-style play about having children, relationships, marriage and love. Life.

Could easily be in the theatre upstairs. Recommended.

[dlevi]

I saw this last night and the 90 + minutes moved along swiftly. I thought it was well designed and staged - though I enjoyed the prop changes there was a lot of unnecessary fussing around at one point one actor removed a small vase of red flowers on one side of the kitchen while another brought on a similarly sized vase of white flowers and they were placed on a different side of the kitchen. Neither vase was discussed and I don't think there was too much time passing between scenes that those flowers indicated ANYTHING. But more to the point - something isn't quite clicking in a play if I'm noticing a minor prop change. The performances are all very slick and Mr Molloy's dialogue is mostly bright, fast and funny but when you get down to the meat of the play -it failed to actually confront a very dark truth. So alas its only 3 stars from me.

[showgirl]

I thought this was fine but not as good as the reviews suggested and only average compared to the usually high standard of Downstairs productions. There seemed to be some obvious gaps in the information and relationships which left me puzzled and unsatisfied. For instance, we heard a lot about Kash's attempts to get acting work and then temporary jobs, but what did Zoe do for a living and why was her work barely mentioned? And given the considerable gap in age between Zoe and Naomi and their very different family circumstances, why were they such good friends - or indeed, in the case of Naomi, was this her only female friendship? I found that implausible and this very partial focus shifted the play out of balance and wondering about the missing details distracted me.

[dlevi]

Jun 3, 2024 3:15:29 GMT showgirl said:

 we heard a lot about Kash's attempts to get acting work and then temporary jobs, but what did Zoe do for a living and why was her work barely mentioned? And given the considerable gap in age between Zoe and Naomi and their very different family circumstances, why were they such good friends - or indeed, in the case of Naomi, was this her only female friendship?

To address ShowGirl's question:  Zoe was a teacher of some sort. There's a line about "...on a teacher's salary." As to the age gap between Zoe and Naomi, I don't know I thought she too might be a teacher, but she has a line saying that she's been defined by raising her daughter for the last 18 years, and if she were a teacher that would certainly keep her busy and not allow her so much time to spend at the gym with Rocco.

[parsley1]

This is sooooo laughably bad

It’s hard to know if the acting or writing are worse

Yet again the soap opera parallel comes to mind

Although that is an insult to the genre

The mind truly boggles that the life of an actor lurches so alarmingly in terms of work calibre

90 mins of excruciatingly unrealistic dialogue with characters who are evidently in need of their own nappies changing let alone being capable of dealing with a baby

Who did not think financial planning for a baby needs factoring into the equation

Whose every response to a minor blip is hysterical and ridiculous

God knows who proof reads and programmes sh*t like this

[merrilywereadalong]

A very enjoyable evening for me though I would agree with dlevi that when it *really* comes down to it the play doesn't approach it's subject matter (ie: the highs and lows and trying to concieve and navigating relationships) with any substantial thrust. But even at surface level I had a good time. It's amusing and moves quickly for the most part and is aided greatly by actors who really lift the material and give shade and color to the characters that drew me in. I also along with the poster above wondered about the relationship between the two women and how they became friends, particularly given the age gap (I missed the teacher bit)
Having never seen/read anything else by the playwright I'm certainly intrigued to seek out some of his other works as I enjoyed the banter and punch of the scenes (though I definitely agree with whoever noted that it's so many "scene changes" that after a certain point I was like..ok ok, let's get on with it) but I appreciated how the brevitiy of each scene kept the play moving.

3.5 stars