The Place, London
October 15, 2021
At the end of Cupid’s Revenge, Tom Roden returns to a story from earlier in the evening and speaks of the sort of loneliness that you only experience when separated from someone you are deeply connected with. It was the most personally poignant moment, although far from the only one (it’s surprising how little one-liners can bring things flooding back), during New Art Club’s original, beautifully judged, sometimes funny but sometimes deeply heartfelt show.
Roden and Pete Shenton have been making their very personal humour-infused brand of physical theatre for over three decades. In Cupid’s Revenge, made just before Covid struck but now touring again, the affable pair look at love in all its guises: what it has become, at least at times and for some, and what it really is.
So, what is love? It’s a question long pondered over by writers and philosophers, and there is undoubtedly a philosophical edge here, but underlying everything is a mix of breezy joyfulness and thoughtfulness.
Photo Claire Haigh
On a Will Holt’s set that features a giant heart that looks like it’s plummeted to earth and embedded itself in Roden and Shenton’s astroturf lawn, and a couple of stripy seaside deckchairs, the couple run through lists of things that might illustrate love. The wordplay is clever and original, fast-paced and brilliantly timed, more often than not illustrated by quirky, humorous miming (including the shooting of Cupid’s famous arrow) or moments of happy, free dance.
Love it seems can be whatever you want it to be. Reflecting that fallen heart, the couple first rail gently against some of the things that pretend to be love or might be regarded as love in today’s throwaway world. The absurd rubs up against the serious as pretty much anything and everything comes up, including Kerplunk and genocide in Rwanda (yes, really!). But what happened to romantic love, or love between people, you wonder. Eventually that comes too as Roden and Shenton remind us of first meetings, that brief holding of hands under the bedsheets, and cuddling on the sofa with arms wrapped around each other.
Some of it does seem ridiculous, but just when you have settled down to a bout of silliness, out of nowhere comes a more thoughtful remark. The fact it takes you by surprise makes it all the more hard-hitting. But I’m sure I wasn’t the only person for who small moments brought back tender, perhaps even painful moments.
I defy anyone not to be affected by that poignant final story, but more than anything, Cupid’s Revenge is a celebration, an affirmation: of love, of live, of people, of who we are and what makes us. It left me feeling quite warm inside.
Cupid’s Revenge by New Art Club continues on tour. Visit newartclub.org for dates and venues.