‘The Kitchen Sink’ at the Oldham Coliseum Theatre – review

The detailed consideration of exactly how erect Dolly Parton’s nipples should be in an Arts School entrance painting makes for a brilliant opening scene in The Kitchen Sink. And it sets the tone for this slick and hilarious revival of Tom Wells’ 2011 play, expertly directed by Chris Lawson throughout.

Kath and Martin live in Withernsea, a mildly dilapidated East Coast seaside town, with their two children, Billy and Sophie. They are averagely happy in their underemployment; Kath’s a dinner lady at the local school; Martin’s a milkman on a dwindling round that barely breaks even anymore. Billy wants to be an artist, but isn’t sure how to read the gap between his heartfelt paintings and their reception as kitsch.

Sophie wants to be a ju-jitsu black belt, but may have too many unresolved anger issues for a defensive martial art. Pete’s in love with Sophie, but he’s also trying to be plumber and care for his dope-smoking gran. This is the atomised nuclear family at the point that austerity really started to bite: signalled in the play by the demise of the iconic high street store Woolworths.

Photographer: Joel Chester Fildes

This production has a near perfect cast. Sue Devaney as Kath is hilarious. She has the kind of comedy talent that can make pronouncing the word “couscous” into a laugh out loud moment. William Travis gives Martin a wealth of contained emotions, and some real depth. You feel the weight of his failure, the panic of a man in late middle age whom the world is not simply passing by, but has firmly left firmly behind.

Sam Glen’s Billy deadpans the comedy well but is also able to portray quiet despair, like the crushing moment when self-doubt is confirmed by experience, rather than overcome by it. David Judge gives an amazing performance as Pete. Judge is expert at playing characters not quite at ease in their own skin. Here he is able to find the comedy in every line perfectly, whilst also making Pete strong, vulnerable, very stupid and very loving all at once. He is a rare talent.

The title is a nod to the dramatic form it adopts, the kitchen sink drama of the late 1950s and early 1960s. Then, the stuffy world that had inhabited the stage, one of upper middle class drawing rooms full of mannered dilemmas, was swept aside by a generation of urgent, new voices from the working class. They talked boldly about race, sexuality and sex, constantly pushing at the limits of what the censorship system would allow.

Photographer: Joel Chester Fildes

The Kitchen Sink does none of this. It’s a cosy, bittersweet, gentle comedy. It’s curiously old-fashioned, like the Christmas special of a sit-com fromthe 1980s written by someone like Carla Lane. It’s a bit slow and not much out of the ordinary happens, but it is a loving picture of a certain kind of family life. 

This is an excellent production of a certain kind of comedy, full of domestic laughs and warmth, ordinary frustrations and ordinary failures, a kitchen sink drama for the age of austerity. This brilliant revival that rinses everything possible from the script.

Rating: 4/5

The Kitchen Sink runs until 24th February 2018, for more information visit coliseum.org.uk.

Words by Stephen M Hornby.