Paperwork Theatre in action on Liverpool Light Night 2015. Photograph by Ian D. Hall.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: John Collins, Jackie Jones, Sal Kelly, Barry Mason, Gareth Mitchell, Lydia Parsons, Helen Webster.

What was your most important phone call, the one that changed your life to the point where all that went before it seemed to be almost frivolous, almost lacking in any meaning or semblance of balance, the phone call that changed it all?

Light Night in Liverpool, a towering idea in which the city has taken to with relish as much as the Superlambanana, Beatles Day or the current crop of tourist attractions, the mounted ducks that have appeared out of nowhere, it is the innovation to create a talking point, a spark of conversation which is needed at the best of times and yet, with any conversation, the wrong word in the wrong place can spell doom down the line.

For Paperwork Theatre, Light Night offered the chance to see things through the perspective of such casual conversations down the phone and by utilising the iconic red phone boxes that still stand resplendent throughout the city came up with five different scenarios in which the phone call might just be the turning point in someone’s life.

Five different phone boxes, five different conversations, five different perspectives and each one captured with great wit and pathos. From Superman realising he is stranded by the tunnels with no way home, to a young woman realising that to settle down and have fun with a family is not exactly what she was looking for in life, each vignette, Red Paint, And Then She Said Goodbye, Revolution In The Heart, Superman’s Spare Change and Snowdrops was delivered with style and abundant charm.

Theatre is not the easiest of occupations, it requires great discipline and objectivity, however to perform outside where not only do the elements conspire against you but the more natural forces of the whims of the audience sometimes work against what you are trying to portray, that takes real courage and fortitude. For Paperwork Theatre, a fresh and exciting concept, this was met head on and delivered well.

In the call to the world outside, to those that make Light Night the special occasion that it is, Paperwork Theatre answered the phone and collaborated to make it distinctive and out of the ordinary.

Ian D. Hall