Animal at Park Theatre review: A smart take on disability, dating and online culture
Animal opens with the lead character, David, attempting to utilise a masturbation pump. A cerebral palsy sufferer, inserting his penis into the device’s nozzle is just one of the many things he is unable to do. Explaining why he needs to return it to the online sex shop is another.
What follows is an examination of the intersection between lust and disability, a subject rarely broached in mainstream culture, and certainly not in anything like the hilariously graphic detail found in Jon Bradfield and Josh Hepple’s play.
Impossibly horny, 25-year-old David is talked by his carer-cum-friend Dereck and his flatmate-cum-carer Jill (when dealing with a condition as severe as David’s, the lines become blurred) into setting up a Grindr profile.
It’s a neat set-up, and lends itself well to the stage: David is confined to his bungalow and we’re stuck there with him. Some early failures are washed away when he uploads some pictures of his bigger-than-average junk, leading to a string of casual encounters and one that becomes a little more involved.
What follows is a smart dissection of not just the problems faced by people with conditions like David’s but also the dangers of hook-up culture and the insidious nature of addiction.
At its heart is a brilliant performance from Christopher John-Slater (who has cerebral palsy himself), who nails not only the sense of frustration at being reliant on others for everything from drinking a glass of water to having an orgasm, but the comic timing required to make Animal work as a black comedy.
The acting is solid throughout, with special mention going to William Oxborrow, who plays a series of dubious Grindr matches who visit David’s flat, providing by far the biggest laughs of the evening.
There’s a sit-com style fluency to the dialogue, with the play rattling through scenes at an admirable clip. The wider structure isn’t quite so concise, however, with a few too many narrative threads and a desire to flesh out relationships that could have been left to the imagination, swelling the run-time to over two hours. Very few darlings were killed in the making of this play.
But given how rarely the issues raised in Animal are spoken about, you can understand the desire to squeeze in as many as possible. Smart, funny and genuinely enlightening, Animal carries its heavy themes with remarkable lightness.