★★☆☆☆
Two Stars
Sat here, with the Conservative Whips’ office staring back at me, a clutter of old school ties, fast food wastage and a copy of a Latin Dictionary (the Oxford Edition naturally), I feel somewhat bewildered. This is due to the fact that, to my disappointment as well as befuddlement, I am not laughing. And I cannot understand why.
Whipping It Up, Steve Thompson’s new political comedy, does indeed, as programme sells it, ‘put the government Whips to the sword’. And, watching it, I clearly see that it is a comedy; at many moments the script is a veritably fine one. It falls, sometimes quite jarringly but on the whole oddly smoothly, between the subtlety of Yes, Minister and the outright bolshiness of The Thick of It. Yet, I am still not laughing.
Perhaps the problem lies in the fact, in many instances, I feel enlightened instead of amused. The play does at times feel as if I were watching the stage adaptation of a journalistic scoop, the exposé that the scheming Maggie – played in all her seductive capacity by Siawan Clark – so desperately craves. The characters here may only be morally so-so at best, but in a perfectly believable (if not depressingly realistic) way.
There is an element of sinister intent about the show also, which adds to my problem. Not in the script, for that is certainly not the worst lambast I have seen of politicians and their ways – it is no match for Question Time for example, but what is?
No, this sinister feeling arises only in part due to the Machiavellian content. More often a far too serious nature of the characters creeps in, even despite the best efforts of the Christian Kinnersley’s Chief Whip and his crass, but certainly entertaining, mentionings of genitalia and the like. There is a generally stifling atmosphere to much of the play. Admittedly, and wonderfully, this is lifted by the vivacity of the two female performances. Delia, the generic female ‘bitch’ of parliament, for example, is well played by Emily Troup and is a great lesson in how to be both horrible yet likable.
The play is certainly not bad, and it delivers on the satire, but if you attend a showing you must expect to see a satire of the school of Juvenal – critical, savage at times, and, unfortunately, without that many laughs.
