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The Review - THEATRE by BEAU HOPKINS
Published: 24 September 2009

Alec Newman and Jaime Winstone in The Fastest Clock in the Universe

Ridley’s fun Clock ticks right boxes

THE FASTEST CLOCK IN THE WHOLE UNIVERSE
Hampstead Theatre

IF good things come in threes, it stands to reason average ones should come in twos. As if to test this theory, the Hampstead Theatre’s revival of Philip Ridley’s 1992 play The Fastest Clock In The Universe coincides with a new film adaptation of its literary precursor, The Picture of Dorian Gray.
Both explore obsession with youth and beauty. The creators of Dorian Gray fumble out a poor effort at highbrow entertainment, but Clock director Edward Dick and his team are made of different stuff. Ridley may lack Wilde’s compassion, but you have to admit he puts on an excellent show.
Thirty-year-old Cougar Glass (Alec Newman) refuses to grow old. He shares a dilapidated flat in the East End with Captain Tock, who collaborates in his narcissism through bizarre rituals. One is the yearly birthday party.
Every year, Cougar turns 19. And every year he lures a younger boy back to the flat. This year, it’s schoolboy Foxtrot Darling. But his plans must cope with the unexpected arrival of Sherbet Gravel (Jaime Winstone), a sassy chav, teen mum, and foiler of older men’s depredations.
The set is magnificent with its crumbling plasterwork, smeared windowpanes and stuffed birds. Under the actors’ expert vigilance, the action flickers brilliantly between shrill humour and nauseous tension.
But in the clarity of this execution, the play’s faults begin to glare.
Ridley’s idiosyncratic vision of priapic grotesques is beguiling, but his loyalty in this direction proves inimical to a calmer insight.
Under the pressing weight and decadence of its author’s sex-and-weirdness imagery, the play’s humanity slides away.
Until October 17
020 7722 9301

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