Hard Truths

Marianne Jean-Baptiste turns in a splendid performance here as the troubled "Pansy". She's married to "Curtley" (David Webber) and mother to "Moses" (Tiwaine Barrett) but suffice to say she's not an happy woman. Her glass is most definitely half empty as she delivers monologue after monologue of depressing observations about the decline of society as she picks a fight with just about everyone and anyone she can - including her family. That family also includes her more upbeat hairdresser sister "Chantelle" (Michele Austin) and it's through that familial link that we start to discover just what might be driving this obsessively destructive behaviour. It's an observation of a few day in their lives, with limited information available to us before an even less well defined conclusion, but it does provoke thoughts on the importance of family and the perniciousness of grief and mental illness on not just those who suffer themselves, but on those who suffer by association. To that end, there's also quite a touching effort from Barrett as a son who is reserved and may well have learning difficulties of his own as he walks the streets, headphones glued to his head, cutting a rather lonely figure. The dialogue is intense, either delivering the wittily angry rants of "Pansy" or the more convivial ones of her sibling and her young daughters more intent on living the joys of life. It doesn't hang around and is, at times, both an entertaining and difficult watch as it showcases an actor who can invoke a gamut of emotions seemingly effortlessly. I could have done with just a little more context as we are left a bit rudderless at times, but it's still a formidable effort from MJ-B that's well worth an hour and half.