by Jon Grant and Tom Warren

How to Pick Up Girls by Tim Briffa is a sausage-fest of a Battle-of-the-Sexes in the Two Pints of Lager…. mould. It is neither head-scratchingly deep, nor rip-roaringly funny, but does occasionally come to life in flashes of entertaining observations. Adam, Vince, and Nick are twenty-somethings who buy into the “lad culture” of porn magazines and one-night stands, until they see old mother time ticking by. This is the story of their early forays into the serious adult world of relationships and women problems.

However, what follows is neither clever nor insightful. The plot struggles to develop beyond the superficial level of “boys on the pull”, and this is in part due to the often flat performances of the cast, who struggle to develop any chemistry with one another. Largely though, it is because the storyline is too base, neither developing the plot nor the characters enough, to give the actors an anchor in their roles.

It’s as if Briffa felt as an hour an a half wasn’t enough to convey the complexity of real people so instead presented two-dimensional images typecasts with only one thing on their mind, and this “thing” was in their pants. That’s a real shame because this could have been an opportunity to question more deeply those stereotypes and provoke debate. Instead it perpetuated this and, thus, at times dragged because it was banal and lacked meaning.

Where, if anywhere, the play does excel is in its comedic observations of popular society. Aside from the “philosophical questions” of “Who would you rather sleep with; Carol Smiley or Carol Vorderman?” or “Barbara Windsor or Pauline Fowler?” (“now or in their prime?”), How to Pick Up Girls does pose the more challenging “Why do all successful female singer/songwriters have a face like a horse?”, and “Will porn mags die out with the advent of the internet?”. However, these moments are in too short supply to hold the audiences attention for the length of the disproportionately long first half of the performance.

The second half of the play, much better due to its more compact timescale, contains more drama as the geeky Nick is dumped by his first proper girlfriend, and seeks to re-integrate into the group of friend he had been shunning. Yet, again, the attempt to portray these emotions fails due to a script which must sound good on paper or when read on one’s own, but fails to hit the same heights the actors are scaling due to the inappropriate complexity of the language used. Moreover, due to the disproportionate length of the two halves of the play, split by a ten minute interval, “How to….” lacks balance and a conclusive end.

In its defence, though, How to… never claims to be this insightful piece of thought-provoking drama. Its aim is to entertain and, though it drags at times, it does this, as was testified by the woman about two rows back from me who was in stitches for large parts of the opening half an hour.

Which brings me to my final positive about this night out; the Etcetera Theatre, though small, is an excellent, informal, and friendly venue, perfect for this kind of theatre. Long may it be a stomping ground of fresh talent.

Booking details (including online booking).