Lorna Irvine struggles with a production 'not without its moments'.
There is a moment halfway through Tidy Carnage's Dream/Life when performer Neil John Gibson sings Feeling Good in the style of godawful band Muse. This sums up his performance: a little derivative, like an inferior cover version of a classic song.
A young married couple, Ian and June, are torn apart when Ian (Gibson) contracts Motor Neurone Disease. As June (a fantastic Helen Cuinn) tenderly nurses him, the past, present and dream states blur: tentative romance, bleeding into his spasms and sifting through vinyl and clothing, getting ready to leave.
Some of the choreography is amazing, brittle or graceful, but the narrative has a treacly backstory which feels emotionally manipulative. The couple seem more like stereotypes than fleshed-out characters: June speaks of being shy; Ian is bolshy. June likes Amelie; Ian is laddish and doesn't.
And therein lies the problem—with stronger characterisation and less sentimental clichés (their individual monologues are riddled with them), a more affecting meditation on love and illness would emerge.
Not without its moments, though, and the shimmering multimedia by Rachel Frances Sharpe, Bella Riza and Alberto Santos Bellido is gorgeous, reminiscent of both 4AD designer Vaughan Oliver and painter Alison Watt's enigmatic romanticism.
Run at The Arches is complete.
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