Review Theatre: Come back to the 5 & Dime, Jimmy Dean | Upstairs at the Gatehouse | Porsche

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The Review - THEATRE by SIMON WROE
Published: 1 October 2009

Come back to the 5 dime

Dustbowl diner where Dean is forever young

COME BACK TO THE 5 & DIME,
JIMMY DEAN, JIMMY DEAN
Upstairs at the Gatehouse

HERE’S a riddle: Who was born in 1931 but remains a tender 24 years old? James Dean, that’s who.
The film star, who bought the farm very soon after he bought a Porsche 54 years ago this week, is sealed under the veneer of celluloid as an eternal youth.
But Dean’s rules do not apply to the rest of us, who must grow old and watch our proud youth crumble.
The passage of time proves particularly hard for the “disciples of James Dean”, a group of women who meet in a
5 and Dime store in a fictional dustbowl town every year on the anniversary of their idol’s death.
Twenty years on, it is not just the ladies who are coming home to roost.
Secrets will be revealed; illusions shattered.
Ed Graczyk’s drama introduces the characters one at a time. There’s Mona (by name and by nature), who may or may not have conceived James Dean’s child; pneumatic blonde Sissy; trash-talking Stella May; sweet, simple Edna Louise; and the mysterious Joanna.
On the other side of the stage, younger versions of Mona and Sissy drift in and out.
At times the lines are garbled and the plot is occasionally hard to follow, but in general the all-female-but-one cast is impressive.
Julie Rose Smith as the older version of Sissy, a former roller-disco queen, is a
stand-out.
Graczyk’s play rarely sees the light of day on the London stage. Its absence seems strange given its topicality: the cult of celebrity rolls ever onward, and the light-hearted swap of James D for Jesus C nails the whimsical belief systems of today’s generation.
If there’s an obvious fault with Come Home, it’s the pat sermonising of the conclusion.
Jimmy wouldn’t have liked that, but then he was never one to stick around to the end.
Until October 18
020 8340 3488

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