This Charming Man – unity Theatre

Sian Davies’s show, part of Liverpool’s Homotopia Festival, was warmly received by a home crowd, keen to proudly welcome the Edinburgh Fringe Comedy Award winning stand up back to her Liverpool home.

This Charming Man tells the story of Davies’s life to date and her experiences of the male role models in her life, punctuated by her vast knowledge and significant love of The Smiths. As that famous Johnny Marr guitar intro hit the auditorium, the crowd were clearly ready for a night of entertaining banter, thought provoking observations and candid opinions of the world that has brought Davies to this point in her life. Arming everyone the crowd with a kazoo, to be used every time they spotted a Smiths lyric, allowed the Smithspotters amongst us to finally get a return on those teenage years pouring over Hatful of Hollow, Meat Is Murder or The Queen is Dead, and kept the audience keenly immersed in Davies’s monologue.

By her own confession, Davies loves men, but she has a toxic relationship with all her male role models and asks why she has admired those who have done nothing but let her down. Davies both asks and answers these questions with humour, warmth and honesty and despite some fair provocation, without bitterness or cynicism. Her father was the first. His death when she was 17 was a huge let down for her, not because he died so young, but because he did not pass on his electrician skills to his self -identifying butch lesbian daughter who now she feels shame every time she has to get a sparky out to fix her lights (Cue: There is a Light That Never Goes Out /Chorus of Kazoos) and so she continues in this vein. Her grandfather, who she can forgive for being a violent and abusive alcoholic but not for being a working class Tory voter; her neighbour for whom she babysat and who showed her much appreciated support and recognition but ultimately was a convicted sex- offender; the local priest whose preaching created teenage self loathing ; her adulterous ex father in law who moved her deeply when speaking of love and commitment when she married her wife, but was being unfaithful to his own wife at the same time. Each story told with humour, understanding, truth and appropriate interjection of lyrical Morrissey (her description of whom I could not repeat here, but did agree with).

Davies’s strength is that she has good material, which could be great, and she knows how to connect with and entertain her audience. She has strong opinions, most of which I agreed with, and an ability to point out, laugh at and make peace with the hypocrisy of the human.

My concern about the piece was the pace and the flow. The timing was a little out on occasions and she rushed through thoughts and observations that deserved more space. This was a Caption supported performance which I applaud for its inclusivity, but in doing this, it seemed that Davies was very much sticking to the script, unable to ramble, respond or go off on a tangent and therefore requiring some prompts during the performance. I felt that had she been left to flow without constraint it would have been more seamless. Her use of video and music worked well throughout and her final sequence video in drag was clever, very entertaining and right on message.

I found Davies a very engaging and charming woman, easy to respect for her ability to be real about the men in her life, to find the humour in and forgive those who have let her down, to understand that they are human, and they need to be loved. Just like everybody else does.

Reviewer: Lou Kershaw

Reviewed: 12th November 2022

North West End UK Rating: ★★★