Fantasy isn’t factual but it’s true, said Ursula K Le Guin. Jack Bradfield’s script opens with an epigraph from the legendary science-fiction writer and it is fitting for a play about a multi-generational group of friends who come together to play, fight and exorcise difficult emotions over the table-top role-playing game, Dungeons & Dragons.
They are at the Warboar Boardgames cafe in Bromley, on a hexagonal table with a model dragon dangling above (stage design by Alys Whitehead). Their alternate reality includes a Nightmare King, a wizard, goblin, murderous crow and many dangerous quests. The game, jointly devised by characters, leads them back to themselves and all the things that are too charged to look in the face in real life.
For the group’s youngest member, Jess (Ruby Stokes), aged 16, this is the death of her brother who was passionate about fantasy. For twentysomethings Milo (Jamie Bisping), who is chippily unemployed, and trainee corporate lawyer Maryn (Sara Hazemi), it is a form of grieving too – both were friends with Jess’s brother. There is also fiftysomething Dennis (Paul Thornley), who owns the cafe, and his new girlfriend Bev (Debra Baker), who prefers Monopoly.
Structured around their games, this is a great idea for a play that does not quite achieve the right balance between reality and fantasy. As someone with no understanding of D&D, the mechanics of the game and rules of play were confusing for me at times.
Under the direction of Ed Madden, there are glimpses of real life, and relationships, when the friends float back out of their fantasy realm and these moments are absorbing, if only they were longer and more rounded. Did Jess’s brother suffer from depression, schizophrenia or something else? Why was fantasy so important to him? What comes of Maryn and Milo’s kiss, given her lesbian relationship? How does Maryn resolve her ideological differences with Bev? These trajectories feel stalled by the game itself, which is charmingly enacted but the bubbling tensions and frissons between characters remain under-explored, the resolution of grief too neatly packaged at the end too.
All of it means there is not enough emotional jeopardy, despite able performances. It is a shame because the set-up is original, and the friendships are endearing. Perhaps it just needs the right tweaks between real life and the world of the game for the dramatic wizardry to come to life.
