REVIEW | Sputnik Sweetheart, Arcola Theatre

Reviews

1 Nov

`Sputnik Sweetheart production image. Photo: Alex Brenner`

Written by Russell

*Disclaimer: Gifted tickets in return for an honest review

A beautiful, magical, a bit mystical, slightly confusing, complex love story. Haruki Murakami’s novel is very impressively brought to the Arcola Theatre stage by Melly Stills’ adaptation and Director Bryony Lavery.

The play opens with the feisty, unpredictable Sumire and her best male friend ‘K’. This is a story of unrequited love, ‘K’ has got the hots for Sumire, big time. But unfortunately ‘K’, YOU’RE WASTING YOUR TIME MATE. She’s not interested in you. Her interests lie elsewhere. Sumire fancies herself as a bit of a writer, heavily influenced by Jack Kerouac, and at a party,

Sumire meets and falls in love with an older, successful Korean business woman seventeen years her senior -Mui - and accepts her impromptu offer of employment as her assistant and travels far and wide, well Tokyo, Italy, Switzerland and Greece with her, tasting and buying fine wines and living a high life. Four days into a jaunt to the Greek islands Sumire disappears and this becomes a detective story, and her best friend ‘K’, (who is still besotted and sexually attracted to her) sets out on a mission to find her.

It’s a very clever but basic stage setting, a telephone box on casters is almost like another character in the play, with its multi-uses.

There's a lot of the communication between continents done via the telephone box, remember this is set in pre-mobile phone days, and the whole thing works magically.

The use of simple pencil animation projected onto small screens interweave with the live action helping us follow the story and keep us amused throughout. The Sputnik connection is meant to be symbolic of people going on a long journey but never quite reaching a destination. There is much beauty on display here, the beauty and the skill of the writing, the beauty of the performers, the beauty and entrancing dance and movement, and the beauty of holding the audience's attention for nearly ninety minutes. There were times when the narrative wasn’t entirely clear but what was presented was beautiful to the eyes, beautiful to the ears, and beautiful to the audience’s imagination.

And the surprising moments of down to earth humour added to the charm of the whole piece. I strongly recommend you go along and see Sputnik sweetheart, with an open mind and an open imagination.

Starring Millicent Wong as the very unpredictable Sumire, a very convincing Naruto Komatsu as K. The elegant beyond words Natsumi Kuroda as Miu and Yuyu Rau as Mrs Nimura.

At Arcola Theatre until 25 November.