time 

Pictures: Hugo Glendinning

To Move in Time 

The Door, Birmingham Rep

*****

Writer Tim Etchell’s performance-piece introduces us to the performer Tyrone Huggins, who immediately held us spellbound for this thought provoking and entertaining monologue.

The most challenging thing an author can ask of his actor is to break through the fourth-wall and speak directly to the audience. It takes a huge amount of courage and technique to do this, and many actors find it impossible to effectively achieve.

However, Tyrone engaged the whole audience immediately, and we were instantly hooked by his warm, dry and charming personality. 

The premise of this piece is for the actor to ponder on the possibility of time travel. He shares with us his thoughts and the many possibilities of what that time travel might entail. He ruminates on being able to go back into the past and change things for the good. How he might prevent an accident or prevent people from making foolish decisions. He also looks to the future and wonders if he could prevent disasters and calamities. 

Tyrone

Finding rime to hear te thoughts of Tyrone Huggins

There is much humour in his ideas, and the audience was entranced and amused at some of the more outrageous proposals.

As a result we were totally in his hands and under his power, and we embraced his character with genuine affection. 

At times there were darker moments, where he explored some of the possible consequences of his actions. 

And with the use of his excellent technique, Tyrone was able to create thoughtful and sombre moments, and we were forced to consider whether this gift would be a boon or a curse.

His constant, incessant thinking process often became quite manic as he shared his frenetic stream of thinking, and one did wonder at times if he may be on some kind of spectrum, and that his ability to time travel might be a curse rather than a gift. And we empathised that he might need some peace from such an overactive brain. 

Overall, this was a stunning, not-to-missed piece of theatre, with not only beautiful writing, but also the chance to see an outstanding and technically perfect performance. To 24-05-24.

Jonathan Owen

21-05-24 

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