Bungalow by Ruth D'Silva is a terrifying drama about abuse and intergenerational trauma in a contemporary Anglo-Indian family, directed by Beth Kapila and produced by Jessie Anand. Agatha (Lydia Bakelmun) returns home when her father is unwell in the hospital to support her Mother, Bernadette (Fisun Burgess), and to have a very important conversation. But as she struggles to get Bernadette to listen to her, Agatha also has to contend with avoiding visits from her brother Luke (Mikhael DeVille) and the attempts of her boyfriend, Steven (Jack Bence), who unexpectedly appears, to persuade her to have a “normal” relationship with children on the horizon. I felt like the play was summarised well when Steven wailed that his relationship with Agatha is like opening one can of worms after another about her past. Bungalow is a complex play of so many layers that build and build and build upon each other and it's a pleasure to see plays that defy simplicity like this being staged. Particular praise is due to Bakelmun's performance as Agatha and the direction by Kapila, particularly in Agatha's scenes alone, as I've never seen a character so obviously traumatised come across with such nuance.
Bungalow is a play about behaving extremely differently depending on who is in the room. My favourite aspect was watching Bernadette (played expertly by Burgess) basically throw herself at the two male characters in the play, while shutting down and snapping at her daughter. Bernadette alternates between practically flirting with Steven, while vehemently taking Luke's side against his wife (whether he wants her to, or not), and criticising almost every woman she encounters. Time and time again, Bernadette is shown willing to compromise her values for the approval of a man and she's a keen advocate for women and children being hit if they are not obedient. Watching Bernadette enthusiastically continue the patriarchy in the absence of her husband is truly disturbing and Burgess's vibrant performance really nails this element. There is also a deeply uncomfortable family diner scene in Act 2 where we see Luke's desperation, excellently acted by DeVille, after he has imploded his life by following in the patriarchal footsteps of his father and mother. D'Silva's genius is showing us why characters who fully understand the experience of being abused might choose to continue the cycle.
I found the mother/daughter relationship depicted in Bungalow unique in the history of family drama. This isn't Mag and Maureen Folan in Martin McDonagh's The Beauty Queen of Leenane, conducting slow, calculated warfare against each other, but a relationship where the aggression is much more unpredictable and nonchalant. While the final show-down between Bernadette and Agatha in Act 2 is truly explosive and heartbreaking, there is an especially powerful moment in Act 1 where Agatha persists in asking Bernadette to sing a song and Bernadette responds very casually with violence. When Agatha responds with gentler violence, Bernadette wails like a child to Steven, utterly baffled that her violence should have received any retaliation from her daughter. It's easy to see from this moment and others how Agatha and Luke were downgraded in humanity by their parents, who saw them as their property. D'Silva is particularly clever to have Steven respond to this moment of violence by asking Bernadette to stop because Agatha is the future mother of his children. I both punched the air that somebody was finally calling out Bernadette's abuse, but was horrified that Steven isn't defending Agatha simply because she deserves to be treated well. Steven is the nicest man in the play by a mile, but this is his ultimate verdict on Agatha and Bence plays a “good guy” who has no idea that his attitudes are problematic, extremely skilfully, winning us over and then kicking us in the gut.
This is also a family drama with house horror. The bungalow, that has seen so many dark scenes and twisted secrets, starts to crack as the play moves on and I was impressed by Caitlin Mawhinney's set design and Cheng Keng's lighting design, which created this eerie, slowly crumbling world. I can immediately see Bungalow being turned into a horror film, just as the disintegrating Manhattan apartment in Stephen Karam's family drama The Humans becomes an actual character in the play and even more so in the film version. It's a play with a really stellar cast and very sensitively directed by Kapila and if you love a haunting family drama, but want to see something fresh in the genre, then Bungalow is for you.
Review: Emma Dawson