Wyndham’s Theatre – until 9 March 2023
Reviewed by Claire Roderick
4****
Returning to the West End after a successful run last year, Steven Moffat’s seriously silly play dispels the Winter blues with its excruciating comedy of manners.
The uptight middle class couple Peter and Debbie are now played by Lee Mack and Sarah Alexander. They meet the gregarious American Elsa (Frances Barber) on a cruise, and begrudgingly end up giving her their contact details, expecting her to do what all decent holiday acquaintances do – promise to keep in touch but never, ever make contact again. They haven’t reckoned with the force of nature that is Elsa, and she manipulates and arranges to come and stay with them. Belatedly worrying about who exactly they are welcoming into their home, Debbie googles Elsa and discovers that she has probably murdered six people, but there is lack of evidence to prosecute. However, as it is too late to “unfriend” Elsa on Facebook, Elsa arrives and the couple are too British and too polite to confront her, and their feeble attempts to broach the subject end effectively when they don’t want to upset her. Elsa’s presence in the house elicits a remarkable transformation in their two teenage children. (The couple’s relationship with their children is slightly bizarre – this is a man who has forbidden his son from farting downstairs, instead banishing him to a less public area.) Within a few days Elsa has convinced Alex (Jem Matthews) that staying upstairs playing online games is unhealthy and he begins exercising, while Rosie (Maddie Holliday) stops prowling around eavesdropping and begins to chat happily with her parents. “She’s Murder Poppins!” Elsa is written cleverly, slithering out of awkward questions with an unhinged cocktail of steeliness, homespun wisdom, some unpleasant truths, childishness and creepy sultriness that make her a force of nature sweeping everyone along with her. It’s never clear whether she means anything she says or is just manipulating everyone around her, but she soon has the children and most of the neighbours eating out if her hand.
The laughs come fast in the first act, with Barber chewing the scenery as the brash and uninhibited American and Mack squirming with increasingly maniacal energy as he deals with embarrassing and uncomfortable situations escalated by the couple’s inability to talk honestly with Elsa. The second act scene where he is trying to ascertain whether Elsa has poisoned a police officer (Muzz Khan) is a masterclass in physical comedy as Mack gurns and gestures through the excruciating situation. Mack excels in roles like this – and at times it feels like an extended episode of Not Going Out, which is probably the biggest draw for this run of the show. Another sitcom veteran, Alexander has a less showy role, but is wonderful as the equally uptight Debbie who bemoans the fact that she has never killed anyone herself. “It’s been 6 days and no murders” says Peter at one stage. The couple’s almost pathological avoidance of embarrassment and conflict (except with their children) allows Elsa to settle in and get to know the neighbour (Nick Sampson nailing the passive aggressive bore) before she finally moves on after Debbie finally speaks her mind – but not without leaving an unusual parting gift.
This isn’t a ground-breaking comedy and has the comfortable feel of a familiar sitcom thanks to Lee Mack’s assured performance. Moffat knows how to tell a story and director Mark Gatiss knows how to sell a story, making The Unfriend a sure-fire hit.