REVIEW: FOAM by Harry McDonald at Finborough Theatre 19 March – 13 April 2024

“Moving, provocative, and memorable” ★★★★★ 

It’s 1974, and we’re in a public toilet. 15-year-old Nicky (Jake Richards) is shaving his hair with a razor, standing over the sink. Enter a man calling himself Mosely (Matthew Baldwin), who has arrived looking for Nicky, and proceeds to essentially groom the teenagers into joining his Fascist ‘club’. He gives Nicky a pair of Doc Marten boots, which Nicky takes with relish, then breaks Mosely’s nose after Mosely calls him queer. The transformation to skinhead is complete.

Foam is a superb play about identity and the failure to find it, what it means to be queer, and how vulnerabilities can be exploited by extreme groups for violent ends. There are some obvious crossovers with Shane Meadows’ This is England: in both, we see young people looking for acceptance in a society that rejects them, and people who declare that they hate others whilst secretly harbouring those same desires. We follow Nicky as he tries to navigate his outward identity as hostile, hyper-masculine skinhead, and hidden identity as a queer. A constant threat of anger and aggression hovers through almost every scene.

And every scene is set in a bathroom. We’re allowed the time to observe the detail of the set in the opening scene, where Nicky slowly shaves his head – the sink and urinal, the cubicle in the middle, the cold white tiles. The tension is heightened throughout by cramping us into this tiny space, designed for one purpose but so often used for other reasons. The atmosphere is repressive, the action variable from scene to scene but essentially the same: aesthetically sterile yet a place containing the strongest of emotions: desire, infatuation, fear, aggression.

In this space, Nicky has various one to one encounters or confrontations, all of which provoke and challenge his split identities. We see his rise and fall, his power waxing and waning, yet his frustration remaining the same. A standout scene sees Nicky working as a security guard for a gay bar, where he confronts Bird (Keanu Adolphus Johnson), who had spent time in prison for beating up a skinhead. The tensions and conflicts of the play are most visible here: can it be right to enact violence on someone, even if their views are so deplorable and full of hate?

Bird is also wearing Doc Marten boots, yet, as someone who is apparently openly gay, could not present himself more differently to Nicky, who is pushed to the fringes in this scene, as Bird assumes a central position on stage. We are reminded that the ‘original’ skinheads were a working class, anti-austerity movement, without the far-right associations, and the threat of Nicky’s boots becomes diluted as we see them presented more as a fashion choice than a marker of his ‘tribe’. Costume is a further strength of this play, not only the ever-present boots, but Mosely’s seductively stylish black outfit, or the bomber jacket of Kishore Walker’s Gabriel, which emphasises his youth and naivety.  

The last scene finally allows us to see Nicky truly vulnerable, in a way that I initially worried would be too cliché, but was handled excellently. Again we are asked to question to what extent Nicky should be punished for his history of violence and even murder. Matthew Baldwin returns in this scene as Nicky’s lover, in a role delightfully opposite to Mosely. We wonder whether his love has been enough to redeem Nicky, whether it has given him the chance to atone. The anger that hovered earlier is flipped to tenderness, love, pathos, which perfectly balances the rest of the play.

This is an excellent play: moving, provocative, and memorable. The pain and repression of someone struggling with their identity were palpable, and the entire cast brought their characters to life. A must-see.

Foam, by Harry McDonald 
Finborough Theatre
Tuesday, 19 March - Saturday, 13 April 2024
https://finboroughtheatre.co.uk/production/foam/

Matthew Iliffe directs Jake Richards (Nicky Crane), Matthew Baldwin (Mosley/Craig), Keanu Adolphus Johnson (Bird/Nurse) and Kishore Walker (Gabriel/Christopher) in this new play, inspired by the true story of Nicky Crane, explores the collision of queer identity and extremist politics against a backdrop of 1970s and 80s London.

The production has Set Design by Nitin Parmar, Costume Design by Pam Tait, Lighting Design by Jonathan Chan, Sound Design by David Segun Olowu, Fight and Intimacy Direction by Jess Tucker Boyd and Assistant Direction by Tania Khan.

Reviewed by Jonny Kemp