'Staffroom' at the Tristan Bates Theatre is an account of the school year as told by the members of staff during their well earned breaks. It's a dark comedy that also isn't afraid to examine social issues from various angles and manages to do this without ever feeling forced or labouring.
The action is split up into naturalistic scenes of dialogue between the staff members and monologues which unfortunately air on the side of unnecessary, attempting characterisation which would be much more successfully realised through natural character interaction rather than direct dictation to the audience, which ultimately served to disrupt the pace of an otherwise fluid piece.
The show contains some terrific use of audience interaction, from forcing theatregoers to take photographs of the cast, to asking one member of the audience to go on a date with one of the characters. These are all very successful at breaking up the show and were the highlight of the experience for many viewers, myself included.
The main issue with the show is that it is more of a brief window on the lives of others than anything with a real plot. Unfortunately this means that while explaining itself as a dark comedy it failed to ever actually realise this, skating around the edges of some darker issues without ever taking the plunge and exploring them from their crummy roots upwards.
The play is overall an enjoyable one, and there are some terrific scenes, in particular an exploration of how it feels to be on both sides of a picket line, but these are not the norm within a play which uncovers interesting ideas but chooses not to get its hands dirty.
