Frantic Assembly explore how memory taints and transfigures love in 30th anniversary production
Imagine if the memories of your last relationship, good, bad, and somewhere complicated in between, were crammed into hundreds of drawers in a huge, charcoal filing cabinet. Imagine climbing on these drawers, dancing over them, rummaging through them with your ex partner and, as you reminisce, finding that perhaps your memories aren’t what you think they are at all – Lost Atoms explores how memory and love actively influence each other in this beautiful two-hander.
Andrzej Goulding’s set is the backbone of this piece, the filing cabinet wall provides endless opportunities for it to be interacted with beautifully – as a bed in a hotel room, as a rocky Grimsby beach, as a window, perfect to drunkenly clamber through. It never got boring to watch it transform. Joe Layton, who played Robbie, and Hannah Sinclair Robinson, who played Jess, both gave charming, raw and real performances as their characters – two young people grappling with their own problems and each others, navigating life in London together.
I found the writing to be sometimes excellent, particularly in comedic moments, such as the meeting of parents, and also in some vulnerable sequences, like when Robbie spirals about his fear of abandonment – reciting “Don’t leave me, don’t leave me.” But sometimes, it felt as if things were mentioned too explicitly, as if too little faith was put in the audience to understand. It was more effective and had a stronger emotional weight when the audience were trusted to infer, from the body language of the actors, rather than when meaning was spelled out explicitly for us from the dialogue. After purchasing the play text, I noticed that the ending was changed for the production I watched – notably the last line (no spoilers!) which I feel leaned into the more explicit, spelled out idea, where the original version in the play text was more effective. I wished that the writing allowed for the visual acting to do more of the storytelling consistently, rather than sporadically.
It is not surprising to you, I’m sure, that I want to mention how phenomenal the movement sequences were. Frantic Assembly’s physical theatre has earned them a strong sense of identity, and a reputation for greatness that is difficult to rival. I particularly enjoyed a sequence of Robbie and Jess as they slept – watching how they, subconsciously, half asleep, comfort each other, tossing, turning, and holding. The sequence explores how what we find too difficult to express verbally, we can express physically, asleep and away from inhibitions. A really beautiful and moving moment.
Lost Atoms is a beautifully produced piece, of the high quality you would come to expect from Frantic Assembly, with particularly notable set, and delightfully human performances. It runs from Tuesday 11th November – Saturday 15th November at The Lowry.