Samuel Barnett and Declan Bennett excel at the Menier Chocolate Factory in this beautiful new version of Kiss of the Spider Woman
“Sometimes that kind of behaviour can get in a man’s way”
Despite playing at the Menier Chocolate Factory, this version of Manuel Puig’s Kiss of the Spider Woman is not Kander & Ebb’s 1993 musical, just so you’re clear. What it is, is a beautifully calibrated and ferociously emotive study of love and loneliness and what, if anything, masculinity means.
This new adaptation by José Rivera and Allan Baker casts right back to the original novel, jettisoning memories of the 1985 film too, to trace the burgeoning relationship between two cellmates. Political prisoner Valentin and sexual deviant Molina have little in common but through their shared trials, something beautiful thrives.
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