Review – Netflix and Chill!

Welcome to Netflix and chill! What happens? First you go to a cafe, a greasy one is preferable and then grumpily wait for your date, play with sugar cubes, wonder how many greasy fingers have touched them, grump a bit more. Here enters the date, an older lady but hey ho, Ben is not pleased at her presence, in fact the opposite. She sits down and we get Ben’s thoughts ( through a very effective voiceover) she’s his mum! A tricky meeting with an irresponsible parent, perfect! And who doesn’t discuss family history in cafes? This is perfectly played by Tom Stocks and Julie Binysh, it hits all the right notes.

Second, a superfluous friend and workmate Ryan, a fantastic Joseph Lindoe that seems to have his life sorted out and travelling through it with no regrets but Ben’s increasing or should say decreasing well being, their friendship is wavering to a heartbreaking end. But before that we have synchronised salad chopping and Bohemian Rhapsody. Yes!!! Then we’re taken to the club. Here we see best of the toxic masculinity environment, the pressures to keep face or to have a sexual life and it seems too much at times with the shouting and loud music but doesn’t reality get too much too sometimes?   At the club we meet Sophie, one of my favourite characters, played brilliantly by Emily Ellis and then we get to learn what Netflix and Chill means, welI okay I do ’cause I am a dinosaur.

Second act starts with a bang or should I say with a flush. Ben and Sophie, old friends reconnect and they bare it all both literally and figuratively. What a brave move. Here we see what Ben really feels about things. Followed by the cafe scene with Ben and Jill ( Charlotte Price) which was one of my favourite, honest, sweet and engaging.

Loved the soundtrack, it helps the show tremendously as does the voice over throughout as it underlines how hard it is to say what we really feel, what we really think. And  the way we are taken through each aspect of Ben’s life and the people he deals with. Feels like a kaleidoscope of situations. The staging is great and the direction by Luke Adamson is spot on.

Netflix and Chill is a funny and realistic play, Tom Stocks has written out of his heart and experience and it shows. The care, the humour, the ridiculous situations and the ending make for a fantastic show.  It raises awareness while making you laugh about mental health.