The Silence and the Noise: tender love for tough lives

SIMON PARSONS applauds a hard-hitting insight into the unforgiving lives of too many youngsters

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THIS taut, episodic drama in Bristol Old Vic’s studio space follows the unlikely relationship that develops between naive Ben, a 14-year-old drug runner, and Daize, the neglected daughter of a woman kept and supplied by the local kingpin.

From an initial hostile meeting in the wasteland garden of her mother’s suburban house, where streetwise Daize threatens novice drug mule Ben to stay off her patch, to the growing interdependency of the two teenagers, this is a hard-hitting yet touching piece of theatre.

In a violent, drug-riddled world the youngsters, fighting for survival, are caught between a bleak, dark future without parental guidance and escapist childhood glimmers in the form of names, games and playfulness.

Winner of the 2021 Papatango Prize from over 1,400 scripts, Tom Powell’s sharp, confrontational script is not without humour, with threats, expletives, anger and the destructive effects of drugs set against them role-playing scenes from Fantastic Mr Fox and other vestiges of childhood.

As Ben’s path spirals downwards into violence and Daize’s desperate attempts to stay afloat and in school falter, their mutual distrust, founded on self-survival, is overcome in the face of inevitable tragedy with the need for support and friendship.

Deborah Olat as Daize and Joe Dolan as Ben are excellent in their contrasting roles. Both actors manage to capture lives caught in the balance, with tatters of childhood innocence and fun streaked within the grain of hard learnt, corrupt adult existences.

Director George Turvey’s direction maintains the tension between the couple even as the relationship changes and the superficial bravado of both characters cracks in the face of their growing intimacy, revealing insights into their true hopes and fears.

Although this is a depiction of wrecked childhoods and adult exploitation it is not without hope or tenderness. Lasting only 75 minutes, it manages to show that the brutalised public personas of the two protagonists are merely window dressing for an uncaring world, and the interior lives are there for redemption.

This hard-hitting and moving insight into the cruel and unforgiving lives of too many youngsters is well worth catching on its UK tour.

Runs at Bristol Old Vic until November 14; November 17 - 21, Minerva Theatre, Chichester; November 25 - December 12 Park Theatre, London. Tickets: papatango.co.uk 

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