Jonathan Harvey’s Beautiful Thing, presented by Company of Dramatic Arts (CODA), is a story of love, love that prevails against all odds. Set in a rundown London housing estate, we glimpse the lives of five people fighting for themselves and for each other.
Jamie is shy and struggles at school. His best friend, Leah, was expelled and now drifts through life with a mother who barely acknowledges her existence. The boy next door, Ste, is beaten black and blue at home, and Sandra, Jamie’s mother, is just doing her best.
This is a challenging play with deeply sensitive subject matter, and director Finn Stannard captains it all with a gentle, loving hold.
The cast delivers grounded and heartfelt work across the board. Poppy Cozens as Leah is a hurricane of energy that fills every corner of the room. Willa King adds razor-sharp comedic timing and a fully realised complexity to Sandra.
Michael Hogg offers a gentle and grounding presence as Tony. Max Dÿkstra is understated and brilliant. His Ste is a well of grief, resilience and eventually love.
And at the centre of it all, Jake Walker is extraordinary. His Jamie is so innocent and tender that you feel every inch of him. All his fear and longing and hope.
The chemistry between Max and Jake is off the charts. Their quiet two-handers in Jamie’s bedroom provide moments of reprieve from the harshness of the world outside. Stannard honours the masterful writing of Jonathan Harvey by giving these moments space to breathe.
Against all odds, the boys become each other’s lifeline. It’s the universal, uncorrupted feeling of first love that feels somehow nostalgic. It reminds you of what love is before the world complicates it, or maybe because the world complicates it.
Qtopia is the perfect home for a work like this. It is a venue dedicated to championing queer stories, a living archive of queer history. Walking through its exhibits before entering the theatre enriches the experience and grounds the story in lived reality.
Beautiful Thing was written more than 30 years ago. Watching it now gives some perspective on how far we have come in terms of queer rights in such a short period of time. It is also devastating to realise how recently it was that two men couldn’t marry.
Beautiful Thing holds both hope and heartbreak in equal measure. It is already close to selling out, so get in fast.
Beautiful Thing is presented by Company of Dramatic Arts and runs to 13 December at The Loading Dock Theatre, Qtopia. 301 Forbes Street Darlinghurst NSW 2010.
Tickets: https://events.humanitix.com/beautiful-thing
Website: https://www.companyofdramaticarts.com/
Socials: https://www.instagram.com/qtopia_sydney/ and https://www.instagram.com/companyofdramaticarts/
Photo credits: Alexandra Tiernan
