Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *
Cast: Jackie Jones, Mike Sanders, Katie King, James Ledsham, Sam Walton, Daniel Cassidy, Lisa McMahon.
Life and Time hang always in the balance, a single moment can hang forever in the air; it can be as inconsequential as a gnat’s heartbeat to an Elephant’s ear, it can be as earth-shattering and historic as a single gunshot in Dallas. Each moment we live through has the potential to be remembered for ever. It is though the build up to that instant where time and life clash for a brief while, where they converge and separate leaving the devastation in its wake; it is in the ability to look at what happened before that makes us attempt to make sense of the moment later on, when the next dawn has risen.
When a people and a town are inexplicably linked, when a city grieves as one such as Liverpool did in April 1989, then everybody has a memory that is engrained and becomes part of their psyche, it is written deep and hard wired into their D.N.A. and one that still binds people, or in some desperately sad circumstances, tears them apart. When the powers that be decided that Liverpool Football Club fans were nothing more than cattle to herded in and out of Sheffield Wednesday’s ground, anybody that day could have been lost, the 96 that died will always be remembered, honoured but it is also to those that went to the football match in search of happy memories that will also have the scars, those left at home waiting for news, a phone call, updates from the limited media, anything to say that those they loved were safe.
Ian Salmon’s incredible, superbly written, outstandingly observed and beautifully acted play, Those Two Weeks, encompasses a truth not often investigated in theatre, the build up of life, of joy, of fear, of happiness and regret, words spoken in anger and love, life before the moment that tore through the city, of hopes, dreams and the future, all is captured in a typical Liverpool home where life is of the moment.
Directed by Mike Dickinson and with powerful, stunning performances by the entire cast, Those Two Weeks is as good a piece of theatre that you could hope to witness, a capturing of Time before the event, and on a par, physically and emotionally, with good humour and realisation that would rival Keith Waterhouse’s Billy Liar.
It is almost a Herculean task to tackle a subject as emotive covered in Those Two Weeks but the outcome was one of brilliance; a seething but good natured jealousy perhaps by some on being gifted a chance to see excellent dialogue beautifully handled and one that in the last couple of minutes reached a crescendo of purity as Lisa McMahon’s character looked back on the single moment before everything changed and the following day passed into history.
Those Two Weeks, a highlight of Liverpool theatre, wonderfully presented with absolute care; Ian Salmon and the creative team, a play that in all honesty only love can match.
Ian D. Hall