Beginning

by David Eldridge

You didn't fancy it then?
Fancy what?
Getting in the taxi.
No.

Every story starts somewhere.

It's the early hours of the morning and Danny's the last straggler at Laura's party. The flat's in a mess. And so are they. One more drink?

David Eldridge (Market Boy, The Knot of the Heart, In Basildon) returns to the National Theatre with a sharp and astute two-hander that takes an intimate look at the first fragile moments of risking your heart and taking a chance.

This tender and funny play received its world premiere at the National's Dorfman Theatre in October 2017.

Genres: Plays, Theatre

85 pages, Kindle Edition

Published December 14, 2017

Reviews

[Doug · Rating 3 out of 5]

Update, 11/'22: I did a quick reread, after having read part two of Eldridge's loose trilogy, Middle - which does NOT have the same characters, but is a look at three stages in the relationship/marriage game. I think I appreciated it more on a go-round - it is slightly better than I found the second play (part three not written, as yet.)


While this is a fairly accomplished character study of two extremely lonely and damaged people, reaching out to each other in the aftermath of a housewarming party, I can't really say it particularly breaks new ground or goes anywhere extraordinary.

And two things REALLY bugged me - the first is that there were an inordinate amount of local UK references that meant absolutely nothing to this Yank, and could have been universalized to make them more comprehensible. And secondly, a dozen times (I counted!) Eldridge gave a stage direction that there should be silence for five minutes - and as a veteran stage writer, he should realize that even 30 seconds can be an excruciatingly long time on stage for a silence; as the play only ran 100 minutes total in production, that was obviously ignored by a more savvy director. That said, it got terrific reviews for its initial NT staging, and is coming back for a West End run, largely it seems, due to the extraordinary performances by the actors involved.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68U2a...

[Joe Clegg Prada · Rating 1 out of 5]

A truly bad play. One so obviously, unapologetically written by a man.

How so? Our leading lady Laura has the most one dimensional motive and backstory. No family. No friends (despite having literally hosted a party). Lonely. And she is adamant she fancies Danny.

Danny. Who is, in my opinion, the ick incarnate. And so any ‘connection’ the two speak of as the play unfolds is completely unbelievable to me. I cannot picture any woman in the real world who shares any of the same personality traits as Laura to actually feel the way she feels towards someone such as Danny. He’s awkward, but not in a charming way. Self destructive to the point that any hormones that may have been stirring for Laura at the start of the play will have surely dried up 10 pages in. Danny is the shining protagonist for any awkward man who doesn’t usually have much luck with women.

Danny is a troubled man who’s made mistakes, which Laura barely calls him out on and seems more than willing to ignore. He’s almost allowed to be himself, and get away with his prize, which is Laura’s unconditional affection. Which I think is a stupid message. What change is Eldridge trying to effect in the men who may resonate with Danny?

Laura on the other hand I feel sorry for. I feel like the real Laura is trying so hard to escape this play. But she’s trapped by Eldridge’s words, locking her into this situation with these feelings which, yes, could resonate with some women, but again what is the message?

Laura will simply oblige and keep saying yes. Because Eldridge has written her to. For Danny. Despite, I believe, any real world woman’s common sense. Red flags GALORE. I cheered halfway through the play when, after half a dozen if not more attempts from Laura to get Danny to kiss/fuck her, she finally questions whether it was time he left.

But of course he doesn’t. Because the biggest reveal yet is still to come. Eldridge writes this play awkwardly on purpose. The chemistry which is supposedly a given circumstance is nowhere to be found. And he almost tries to justify this lack of connection and Laura’s constant offering of herself with a reveal so cliche, so dull, so a-man-writing-a-woman that it’s laughable.

This play fails the moment you don’t believe the supposed connection between these two characters. And I don’t. This is not how attraction works. And the hidden stakes, Laura’s REAL motivation, muddies the waters even further, making this a shoddy attempt at a love story with no real reason to exist on the stage.

[Simon Gibson · Rating 2 out of 5]

I am NOT a 40-something who is still looking to find love, and I imagine if I read this in a few decades time I would’ve loved it a lot more - young Simon however found it a little lackluster until the final monologue. It was all lovely, and I enjoyed an evening with the characters, but it didn’t feel like anything I’ve not seen before?

I also couldn’t help but compare it to Eugene O’Brian’s “Eden” which told a similar love story better for me.

[Kelly Stewart · Rating 4 out of 5]

ADing this play at the moment and having great fun bringing Eldridge's writing to life - overall a highly moving and thought-provoking, though personally I prefer Middle

[S · Rating 3 out of 5]

A lovely play exploring loneliness with a spin on it. Nice

[massmarketbareback · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is good. This is very good. I like this one.

[Eleanor]

I read this because my undergrads had to. It’s a one-act play that takes place over the course of about two hours in a Crouch End living room after a flatwarming party, in which two people—Laura, whose flat has just been warmed, and Danny, who turned up with a business client of Laura’s to whom she extended an invitation on a whim—move through the tentative steps of opening themselves up to each other. It’s meant to be played in real time; there are stage directions like [Silence. Five minutes?] As a result, I’m not convinced that reading Beginning is the correct way to engage with it, at least not as a first go-round. Obviously, the actors’ decisions about what to do during those silences are crucial to the way the play goes over, and the way we’re meant to understand the development of their relationship with each other.

That said, though, it’s possible to exercise your own imagination while you read. The reason the undergrads had to read it was because we were talking about time that week, and I’ve always thought that time—both quantity and quality—is something writers use to get us to understand character dynamics. If we’d had the time (heh), Nathan Hill’s Wellness would have been a good counter-example, a novel that is 600+ pages long because it needs to simulate what 20+ years feels like for its protagonists, whereas Beginning immerses us in a floating present (of about two hours’ duration) in order to achieve the same kind of audience empathy. The long view vs. the deep view, I guess. Anyway, I felt I had a better handle on Beginning after discussing it, as usually happens. Source: free access via DramaOnline

[Niko · Rating 2 out of 5]

Didn't find the conversation of the part where she has to stress multiple times that treat her like a human quite comfortable, maybe because it's true and happening in real life than we women(at least me ) have to stress it over and over again to a potential lover. Quite exhausting.. and a bit fed up

[Gregory Knapp · Rating 5 out of 5]

An amazing play.
Starts unassumingly. Builds perfectly -- seemingly unnoticeably -- for a while.
Then, by the end . . . Boom.
Excellent.

[Corey Terrett · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very short but enjoyable read. Some parts didn't work for me as much as other moments did but still an enjoyable read. I'd like to see it on the stage.

[M McCready · Rating 3 out of 5]

LOVE a locked room kinda drama!! good stuff, unexpected i guess?

[Tuti · Rating 4 out of 5]

tender and funny realistic tableau of an awkward beginning

[Lexi Loo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Crazy behavior asking a rando to impregnate u

[Sam · Rating 2 out of 5]

As a text... Nothing special.