JOHN Lutz’s book SWF Seeks Same, and the subsequent film, Single White Female, released in 1992, were huge hits, but I confess to neither having read the book nor seen the movie, so the discrepancies between them and the new stage version, which opened in Brighton in January and is now on stage in Bath as part of a lengthy UK tour, went right over my head.
This world-premiere stage adaptation by Rebecca Reid changes a dog into a teenage child, as well as introducing 21st century technology to fuel the tension – and fuel the tension it certainly does. The story still centres around two women, Allie and Hedy, now transported from New York to London. Allie is a divorcee, newly moved with 15-year old daughter Bella into a badly-built tower block in London while she and her gay colleague Graham finalise a bid for a multi-million pound contract that will lift them out of penury. But in the meantime, since ex-husband Sam has just announced he’s about to become a father again and so the maintenance for Bella will halve, she needs to get some money in to pay the rent.
She advertises on line, and within SECONDS a response comes from a person called Hedra. This personable and warm woman arrives, explains she is a freelance photographer looking for an occasional base in London, and moves in. But (and you might expect this from a thriller) all is not what it seems.
Hedy, as she prefers to be known, is a dab hand at ingratiating herself with one of her faces, and sowing seeds of doubt with the other. It’s quickly clear that her skills at wheedling out personal information are underpinned by technical know-how, and, in this electrically over-reactive flat, it’s hard for Allie to know exactly what is happening.
The flashing neon framing of the set (designed by Morgan Large) and Max Pappenheim’s soundscape build the tension for the audience as the temperature rises for the protagonists. It’s one of those plays where the audience can see it coming, and, in these days of year-round audience participation – something traditionally confined to the pantomime season – there are plenty of opportunities for gasping, whooping and even applause when someone gets their come-upppance.
Kym Marsh’s Hedy never lets the tension slack, and Lisa Faulkner’s Allie is all-too-believable as a fraught mother in a situation she thinks she can solve with just one more super-effort. Amy Snudden is a scarily realistic teenager, caught in one of the many social media traps de nos jours.
Single White Female is compelling and only just crosses the line of hyper-realism – one of those 21st century plays that wins a devoted following and will keep coming back to theatres around the country for years, before it is handed over to enterprising non-professionals to perform. It’s got a lot going for it.
GP-W