Theatre

Face – Isobel

Oran Mor, Glasgow

Mary Brennan

FOUR STARS

IT IS a mischievous opening gambit: the lone character in Face – Isobel sitting down in the front row, and asking “when’s this play going to start?” Hindsight will reveal how apposite this question is, for Isobel – played with a gleeful zest and acid tongue by Janette Foggo – has spent most of her sixty years waiting for the drama of her life to begin. HER life, that is. Not the existence that conformed to the attitudes and expectations of others, first as a child and thereafter as a wife and mother, with daily tedium eroding her innate joie de vivre. Most of all, however, Isobel has felt her true self stifled by Morag, the identical but otherwise un-alike twin sister whose face she shares – and even that could change surgically now that Isobel is striking out as a free agent.

There’s so much wickedly pointed humour in Peter Arnott’s writing – astutely paced by Foggo and director Stasi Schaeffer – that we’re constantly lured into politically incorrect laughter as Isobel pillories those, like Morag, who assume a higher moral ground because they put duty above personal choice, wear their social conscience on their sleeve and, erm, dote on opera . . . especially Wagner. Such barbs are akin to defensive body armour, but Isobel has been so badly wounded by the opinions of others that her hurt and anger keep spilling out through the chinks. Foggo nonetheless ensures that Isobel never slips into whine-y victim-hood. Instead, riding high on the crest of Arnott’s anthem to libertarian hedonism, she teases and challenges us all with the prospect of guilt-free lotus-eating. Next week, it’s Morag’s turn to tell her side of a story steeped in love, loyalty, money and family dysfunction. Can’t wait!

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