Lemons Lemons Lemons
Harold Pinter Theatre

IF I’d read this play before I saw it, I’d never have tipped it for the West End stage… which just goes to show what the charm and star quality of two handsome actors can do.

Heartthrob Aiden Turner of Poldark fame smiles and strolls his way through a deceptively tight and skilful performance as if he’s wearing a pair of cosy slippers, while Jemma Coleman (of Doctor Who and Victoria) keeps us on our toes with her easy physicality and warmth in this fast-moving, multi-scene bonanza. For the audience it feels like a private evening in the company of beautiful people, which is, it seems, sufficient to make it the blockbuster it is.

The play by Sam Steiner hinges on one single, frankly absurd, idea: that the government has, for some inexplicable reason, passed a law that rations language. 140 words is the daily limit per person. If this is enforceable, I’d like to know how.

The audience however swallow it hook, line and sinker and settle in for an evening of  simple narrative entwined with a crash-course in linguistics.

The story, that runs anarchically out of sequence, is this: boy meets girl, boy and girl reach the “I love you” milestone, boy shacks up with girl, boy and girl talk endless drivel and tensions emerge, boy and girl wonder if this the beginning of the end, boy and girl hang in limbo. Only when we get the language ban do they begin to think outside the box and bring a bit of spark to the occasion.

The original play, premiered eight years ago at the Edinburgh Festival, has been performed all over the world. It is studied by academics for its linguistic theories and has even been compared to Samuel Beckett.

But does it work theatrically? The problem is it pivots endlessly around one central idea. The scenes zigzag back and forth between the cat cemetery where the couple meet and the flat where they argue but the premise itself never moves. It’s like a spinning top: fascinating to watch but in the end… so what?

This is, however, a show of outstanding stagecraft. The actors play the audience with skill and panache, directed with commanding assurance by Josie Rourke. Meanwhile Robert Jones’s set – or more accurately backdrop – is, in itself, a staggering work of art worthy of the Tate Modern and what it seems to signify is the complexity and compartmentalisation (of which language is only a part) of all that surrounds one simple couple.

When Oliver and Bernadette (the characters’ names) are in the cat cemetery, they comment on their preference for the palpable silence that surrounds them over the ceaseless bustle elsewhere. And ultimately this is the real meaning of the play: not so much a comment on language itself, but rather an exploration of how our language is infected by the chaotic deluge of stimuli that submerges our lives.

A creaky construct, but illuminated by its two stars and expert creative team.

Runs until March 18 2023. Box office: 03330 096 690 / 0800 912 6971, haroldpintertheatre.co.uk