Jim Kenworth's previous play, Gob, won many plaudits. His latest, Polar Bears is like an episode of The Young Ones, located in East London (Forest Gate) today.
It is set on a shabby three-piece suite in a shared house. The main occupants are Ed, who is uncannily like Rik Mayall; permanent visitor and drug dealer Dole Boy, Nigel Planer with lots of hair; and mouthy Ronnie, as close as we can get to a female Ade Edmondson. The last occupant is resident Lothario, Nash, an Asian who measures success in life in one-night stands.
This group are held together by the pick of the actors, Sarita Plowman as lippy Ronnie. She talks and swears like a bloke and looks as if she has a wicked uppercut too.
The plot is suitably preposterous with Ed kidnapping his best mate who has been sleeping with his girl. To add ballast to the small space, Kenworth, who directs and produces, introduces Nash's spunky Russian one-nighter and together, they play out a small tale of infidelity.
The acting is generally not of a standard that the writer's generally fluent dialogue deserves and the plotting can't support the hour-long duration. There might also be problems with accusations that the ultra-realistic dialogue is too close to racist for comfort.
However, there is an impression that Jim Kenworth can write well but he really needs to pick a fresher group of characters and a stronger plot next time around.