There’s a trickiness in the tricksiness of Eleanor Tindall’s Tender at the Bush Theatre
“You could say, you might say that my life is perfect“
There’s a trickiness in the tricksiness of Eleanor Tindall’s Tender, now playing at the Bush Theatre’s studio. A contrived set of coincidences set things up but then another layer of scarcely believable apparent fatefulness propels the plot at large and it is just *a lot*. I’m all for the power of the suspension of disbelief but Tender really stretches it beyond a conceivable point.
Tindall’s story centres Ivy and Ash, two women in their 30s. After a meet-cute at a club followed by another meet-cute at the bakery where Ivy works – there’s the first coincidence… – chemistry sparks between them. But Ivy’s in a difficult relationship with a guy and Ash has just got herself out of a difficult relationship with lingering consequences – the obvious later coincidence that takes a frustratingly long time to be revealed in the world of the play.
Character-wise, the writing is absolutely on-point, wryly observational about all sorts of contemporary issues and delivered with believable conviction by Nadi Kemp-Sayfi’s Ivy and Annabel Baldwin’s Ash, these are people you want to see a play about. Dramatically though, the show suffers from trying to cram in too many genres without nailing any of them to a satisfying degree. There’s rom-com, psychological drama, elements of horror, all skittishly peeping their head over the turret then popping back down.
Emily Aboud’s production likewise has its moments but with such fluidity of genre, can’t quite nail a tone to anchor the story in a place as authentic as its characters sound. Alys Whitehead’s yellow-hued design and David Doyle’s lighting play interestingly in the space but overall, that confused tone works too strongly against any real convincing tenderness being created that might have made us overlook all those coincidences.
