Men’s Business review

There’s a certain tang, for all that, to Gaynor’s staging, and to the committed performances of Lauren Farrell and Rex Ryan as the miserable pair. Victor (Ryan), whose name is surely ironic, is a surly steelworker with a deep suspicion of women (he never goes home with a date in case, as he puts it, “they get ideas”). Charlie (Farrell) inherited her butcher business from her parents and is hungry for love. In between their joyless fucks, Victor calls her stupid, ugly and a pig; he’s also jealous of her dog (a real German Shepherd makes a rather pointless appearance), which he neurotically suspects of giving her more sexual pleasure than he can manage. In spite of all that, Charlie clings on to their grim connection, and when Victor declares it’s him or the dog, the affair becomes still more grotesque and violent.

Perhaps there’s some subtext here about the commodification of sex, toxic masculinity or the corrosive effects of socially normalised misogyny. But the play is irretrievably flimsy, so it feels pretty gratuitous long before a decidedly phallic gun turns up. Ryan’s cloddish Victor, desperate to assert himself, is aptly repellant and pathetic, and Farrell’s dogged Charlie has a sinewy toughness and unquenchable optimism, even as she degrades herself for the sake of this unworthy man. What’s the point, though? Like the offcuts of offal that Charlie slings into a bucket to sell as pet food, this is a rancid little snippet unlikely to prompt feelings of anything much beyond a slight queasiness.

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