Bug

Friday 25th March and the evening's turned cool after a balmy spring day in London. I'm making my way to Found111, a pop-up theatre hidden within the bowels of what was the Central St Martin's School of Art on Charing Cross Road. Opposite, the Phoenix Theatre is bedecked with lights and glitzy signs for its new show Guys and Dolls but there's no such fanfare at Found111. We're beckoned in through a side door - a temporary sign above it giving the only hint that there's something exciting awaiting us inside.

We climb up several flights of stairs that wrap around an old iron lift shaft. There's a breeze blowing through the cracks in the windows and plaster chipping off the walls. Eventually we reach the bar, it's up in the rafters and the low lighting makes it feel like we're standing in an attic. They're playing honky tonk music befitting the Oklahoma setting of the play we're about to see but this place isn't a dive, it's cosy like an old parlour, and achingly cool with mixologists shaking up impressive looking cocktails behind the bar.

We nab our place in the queue early and by the time the doors to the auditorium are opened, it's snaking off into another room. There can only be about 100 people here though - I get the sense that even those at the back are likely to get a pretty good seat.

We're led through another school corridor that's seen better days then into the theatre itself. I knew it would be intimate, but I wasn't expecting this. There's a bed in the middle of the room with a table and chairs at the side, I have to walk in between them to get to my seat. I hesitate for a few moments wondering if the front row will be too close for comfort but risk it anyway. Is that a cigarette I can smell? I watch as the other audience members filter in, each has the same look of bemusement as they see the tiny theatre. Then I notice a woman stood in the doorway smoking. It's Kate Fleetwood, already in character, filling the auditorium with a scent that evokes sleepless nights in a seedy midwestern motel (or so I imagine!)

The lights go down and a ringing phone on the bedside table cuts through the silence. Fleetwood strides in and answers it in an Oklahoma drawl. Her character Agnes is a cocktail waitress who's hiding from her abusive ex husband and she seems constantly on edge as if it's only a matter of time before he learns where she is. There's no need for microphones in a place like this, I can hear her breathing I'm so close and it feels strangely voyeuristic, as if I'm sat in the corner of her bedroom eavesdropping on her conversation. Soon Daisy Lewis is on set (it would be a lie to call it a stage) and although she looks even smaller than me, she fills the room as Agnes' motormouth friend RC. There are various pieces of drug related ephemera littered about and RC has just returned from a party with her friend Peter. A door in the corner of the room opens and James Norton walks in, I was wondering when he'd turn up. The softness of his voice contrasts with those of the two women we've seen so far and a nervous excitement seems to have descended over the audience.

Peter and Agnes quickly become close, Peter is sweet and reassuringly gentle compared to her ex-husband Goss who makes a violent appearance mid-act. There's an odd dynamic to their relationship though -  Agnes is vaguely maternal, with a reassuring manner and an ability to soothe Peter when he gets upset, but he seems more clued up than her; giving slightly misguided advice on which drugs are healthiest, and making speeches about relationships and the state of the world. He repeatedly tells Agnes he can sense things and read people. When he's bitten by an aphid in their bed, they launch into a hilarious back and forth about what sort of bug it might be, he's obviously some sort of expert and his answers are comically matter of fact. Norton and Fleetwood spark off each other in moments like this, there's an effortlessness to their exchange that makes them seem like an old married couple.



By the interval there's been so much bug talk that I'm already feeling squeamish. My friend and I discuss what we've seen so far. It's both disconcerting and electrifying to be this close to the drama. We're literally looking up into the actors' faces. Watching from such close quarters means you're free to do your own editing, you can watch Norton deliver his line then turn to catch Fleetwood's reaction. It's truly immersive, unlike any other theatre experience I've had.

By the time the lights come back up, the bug problem has become worse, there's fly paper hanging from the ceiling and insect spray cans everywhere. This room, once a safe place for both Agnes and Peter now feels much less so. As both RC and Goss re-enter and quickly vacate their lives, it becomes apparent that the relationship, at first healing for both of them, has taken an unhealthy turn. Amid talk of conspiracy theories, drug trials, human experimentation and government surveillance, Peter's earlier paranoia is burrowing deeper into him and it's bleeding into Agnes, like the insect bites bleeding through their clothes. Peter's descent into madness is quick and certain, with Norton giving an impressively performance that's truly unnerving to watch. Agnes' mental state disintegrates more slowly, and seems somehow more tragic as she falls deeper into the clutches of grief that come from losing a child, Fleetwood's performance is visceral.

I can feel my shoulders rising higher and higher as the action nears is crescendo and when it does, the cheer from the tiny audience is deceptively loud. There may only be a hundred people in this room but it sounds like a thousand.

We negotiate our way across the partially destroyed set, down the staircase, out of the unassuming school building and back to a hotel room that suddenly doesn't feel quite so appealing.

Go to http://found111.co.uk/bug/ for more details about Bug and Found111's previous productions.