Success

It’s non-stop round here, innit? Last night we went to see Success, a new play about, you guessed it, success, at the BATS Theatre. We grabbed a quick pre-theatre dinner at  Muse On Allen, which was unremarkable in its perfection. They know how to do stuff properly there.

Success is a New Zealand play written by Stephen Sinclair, known for his authorship of The Two Towers screenplay in the Lord Of The Rings trilogy. It had its world premiere in Wellington at BATS theatre before transferring to Auckland, and from there, who knows?

The show opens with Carl Evans, played by Jeremy Elwood, doing a stand-up routine, before we cut to the flat and see how life has panned out for his former partners.  He is returning for the first time in four years, and goes to visit his former partners, who are still flatting together in Aro Street. Whilst they still continue to do comedy gigs, one is unemployed otherwise, whilst the other teaches.

Naturally, the reunion is not all that it appears, and whilst at first they try to be friendly, the façade soon wears off and they start telling each other what they really think. It turns out that Carl Evans is on the run from the tabloid press, and the law, in the USA. His history of substance abuse and wild partying are also not endearing him to his former partners…he famously went on the wagon, but less famously fell off it shortly thereafter. One of the flatmates is still bitter about Carl’s alleged theft of material, whilst the other tries to play the peacemaker with varying degrees of success.

Added into the mix is the fact that Carl has an outstanding commitment to play a live, televised gig. He eventually persuades one of his partners to take his place, offering him the chance to make it big (and get paid substantially more than he’s used to getting).

As usually happens in these cases, all the plot lines come together and there is a resolution of sorts. Finally, Carl returns to the stage to give a routine from his new show at some indeterminate time in the future. Clearly playing to a much smaller crowd, and having faced his accuser in the US, he’s now older, and possibly wiser.