Falling in love is easy. Committing to it and making it work is much harder. It’s all been said and seen before a hundred times over. Often times when a relationship begins, the early stages are passionate. Down the road it’s difficult to maintain, and occasionally, it doesn’t work out how it was intended to. This doesn’t necessarily mean that it failed, but it also doesn’t mean it succeeded either. Abi Morgan’s play Love Song directly corroborates these ideas in a production that tells a love story that isn’t so typical. Love Song was staged in 2012 at the Lyric Hammersmith in London, and it’s now available for online viewing.
Abi Morgan’s play Love Song directly corroborates these ideas in a production that tells a love story that isn’t so typical.
This play is told from the viewpoint of two characters, played by four different actors. Two actors play their older selves, the other two play the younger. The audience is able to see the deterioration of the couple’s relationship through the eyes of the older pair, at the same time getting a glimpse of the first stages of the relationship and the vibrancy that it exudes. As the play progresses the reality sets in and the empty spaces become filled, beginning to paint a clearer picture of where things are headed and why they ended up the way they did. Love Song is a story that’s long been told and lived by many in the real world too many times over, but it serves a great purpose in managing the expectations of the youth who dream of love and companionship.
Love Song is a combination of physical storytelling, equipped with dialogue from both versions of the characters. The sound design and visual aspects of the show give it extra life, the music affording the audience emotional evocation with the projections and lighting design assisting the show’s overall tone. The actors give a convincing account of things, the older characters depicting a genuine truth of their present situation, and the younger characters showing the true naivety of people falling in love and the lack of thought put into that is far too common amongst today’s youth. The choreography of the physical pieces are competently staged in coexistence with the music. The director makes a wise choice in the points of the play where the older characters are present with the younger versions as if they’re remembering their life in real time, the audience then able to see the physical effect it has on the elder pair.
Love Song deserves an audience because of how unalike it is from the rest of theatre. It’s a visually appealing show, telling an ‘in the flesh’ chronicle of the challenges of love and holding that bond together through the years and with facing the hard times that come along with it. It’s ‘perfect’ in that it’s ‘imperfect’, and though its aim is not to demoralize those in love, it does show the dangerous issues that are prone to come about when taking that leap of faith. Its run has concluded, but is online at digitaltheatre.com
