RON at Riverside Studios

Veering from comedy into horror with some thorough detours into crime thriller, Ted Walliker’s one-man show Ron – co-directed by Lev Govorovski – plays with all these genres to pose the question: is there anything we wouldn’t do for the one we love, even if the one we love, himself, is really rather indifferent about us?

Opening onto a classic stand-up comedy set – the spotlight, the mic, the curtained back-drop, the slightly unsteady entertainer – Ron delivers on laughs within the first minute or so, offering some choice one-liners that introduce the quality of the writing that is to follow. The story follows our hero Tony on a night out that goes awry, led into all sorts of trouble by his childhood best friend Mike, whom – the audience is tipped off in tasteful asides and rose-tinted flashbacks – he silently and politely longs for.

With enough romance and drama and – especially – violence to keep the audience captivated, we don’t feel any lack from the sparsity of the staging, and music and lighting are deployed with enthusiasm to build the atmosphere of each scene. Walliker himself is abundant with energy – there’s little here in the way of developing characters, and it’s not much needed, but Walliker does well to juggle the voices and body language of his different personas, and there’s not a gesture or glance out of place. This is really Tony’s story, though – Tony’s chance to take the microphone, to express how he feels, and how he sees things, and as such, the intimacy on stage develops solely and quite sweetly between Tony and the audience.

The monologue makes mention of Odysseus, and it’s an apt point of reference – Ron takes us on an adventure, filled with peril and excitement and a morally ambiguous resignation to the unfeeling hand of fate. The play handles dark thoughts and dark acts very lightly; however, there isn’t a clear catharsis to all the mayhem, though that could also prove to be something of a relief for viewers. It is successfully very, very funny – Walliker takes his bow long before our laughter has faded, and the show is to be recommended both for its sense of humour, which is novel, charming and persistent, and for its touching portrayal of doomed young love.