Review: Kiss of the Spider Woman (Menier Chocolate Factory)

Manuel Puig’s 1976 novel, newly adapted here into a play by José Rivera and Allan Baker, puts two very different people into a tiny prison cell. One a left-wing, hard-nosed political prisoner, the other a gay man incarcerated for gross indecency. To begin with, as you’d expect, they ricochet off one another. But over the course of Puig’s intense, intimate story, they become something akin to soul mates.

Set entirely in one lousy, grubby lock-up, Puig’s engrossing narrative – also the basis of a 1993 musical by Kander and Ebb – posits these two as desperate, lonely and frightened. To while away the hours, Molina recounts old classic films he has seen, allowing Valentin to disappear into his imagination and escape the four walls. Over the course of days and weeks, Valentin’s initially gruff, hostile attitude to Molina and all he represents begins to evaporate. When Valentin gets sick, Molina bathes him and trust slowly develops. Human warmth, care and contact begin to change their hell-hole into something of a sanctuary.

Set against a backdrop of the brutal '70s Argentinian regime, which locked up, dehumanised and 'disappeared' many, Puig’s themes are about resistance. But not necessarily political resistance. On the face of it there is little political about the two characters' connection, which is born out of human need and want. But in it existing, it shows the resilience of the human spirit and its capacity for love. Kiss of the Spider Woman is also quietly revolutionary in the way it deals with gender, as the two men begin to define each other not as men, but simply as people. It is a remarkable story, which leaves a lingering reminder of our ability to hate and fear as well as our ability to connect deeply to another person.

Declan Bennett and Samuel Barnett are onstage the whole time as Valentin and Molina. Barnett manages to embody the characters from Molina’s beloved films with a wonderful intensity – accompanied by Andrzej Goulding‘s lovely filmic shadow projections – and his Molina has just the right amount of camp vulnerability. Initially he could not seem more different in the face of Bennett’s swearing, angry Valentin, who the actor imbues with a slight working-class chip. After struggling in the initial scenes with stilted dialogue, Bennett, and in fact his character, warms up. Once Bennett’s character opens up, both Bennett and Barnett are beguiling to watch.

Laurie Sansom‘s strong direction is handsomely supported by Jon Bausor‘s convincing prison set, which almost entirely surrounds the theatre. Sansom wisely focuses in on the rhythm and flow of the play and Bennett and Barnett’s performances, which means we are there with them from beginning to end. It is Rivera and Baker’s script which occasionally jars, as the dialogue attempts to be brusquely modern and the subtext is not left to speak for itself. It could be something to do with the translation, but several times I noticed the script working a little too hard.

Still, Puig’s story, which touches on a sense of both tragedy and hope, is a quietly stirring one. A treatise on what it means to be a man and a human, at the edge of a society intent on destroying you.

Kiss of the Spider Woman runs at the Menier Chocolate Factory until 5 May.