I’m all for a good romcom, especially in the theatre — there are never enough — and even more especially in the murky depths of winter. It does, however, require a vaguely plausible “meet-cute” and two characters who, deep down, are well matched. Hello/Goodbye boasts neither.
Alex (Shaun Evans) and Juliet (Miranda Raison) appear, mistakenly, to have bought and moved into the same flat. Yes, that really is as ridiculous as it sounds. Yet instead of dealing with something as tiresome as the legal niceties, the pair bicker and sort of flirt, as writer Peter Souter establishes that she’s a beautiful, stroppy madam and he’s an emotionally stunted collector of all manner of nerdish oddities.
In the real world, of course, Juliet would eat Alex and his cigarette cards for breakfast. But this is, I suspect, somewhere in male wish-fulfilment territory, which means Act Two finds them 10 years into a “relationship” so flimsily constructed that Souter can barely bring himself to sketch in the details of the intervening decade.
Raison and Evans, impressive actors individually, have zero chemistry in Tamara Harvey’s production and we find ourselves longing for the pair to leave each other — and us — in peace.
Until Friday February 28 (020 7722 9301, hampsteadtheatre.com)
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