'Maggots' review — this bleak portrait of housing crisis and social isolation is a topical moral tale

Read our review of Farah Najib’s debut play Maggots, now in performances at the Bush Theatre to 28 February.

Summary

• Farah Najib's debut play Maggots premieres at the Bush Theatre
• The show examines a group of disconnected tenants who fear for their neighbour
• Sam Baker Jones; Marcia Lecky and Safiyya Ingar play numerous characters
• This study of social isolation is highly topical

At first glance, Farah Najib’s debut play Maggots might appear “simplistic”. Three actors stand onstage to tell us a story that “about a life – or lives – crumbling. Disintegrating. Withering away into nothingness.” But, as they begin to weave through this bleak cautionary tale about a group of neighbours who live alongside each other but barely interact, it turns out to be something far more complex and damning. Merging the personal with the political, it exposes the cold reality of a housing system in crisis and the depths of darkness that emerge from a socially isolated society.

“What does death smell like?” Googles one of the residents of Laurel House. A strange stench has risen from inside the walls of their block. She turns to their community WhatsApp group to share her concern, but her thoughts are quickly dismissed. Still, Najib’s play takes us into the homes of each of the tenants, as they begin to realise it might be more of an issue than they initially believed.

We begin with 58-year-old Linda, the first to smell what she suspects is her neighbour at number 61’s rotting corpse. She lives alone now that her husband Clive has passed away and her daughter has moved to Australia. Next door is Carly, a single mum who is cut off from her own family and turns to smoking something strong to get through the days. Adeel cares for his teenage daughter Aleena as he continues to mourn the death of her mother. Meanwhile, Rebecca works as a care home nurse and lives at home with her physics-obsessed son Jaydn, who is preparing for his GCSEs. “They know nothing about each other,” our narrators tell us. Together, they are a group of lonely souls.

There’s an eerie, advisory quality to Najib’s writing. But, directed by Jess Barton, the one-hour play lacks propulsion. The actors Sam Baker Jones, Marcia Lecky and Safiyya Ingar circle the stage as they tell their tale, pausing in different areas as they go, but the characters they multi-role as stay as half-drawn sketches.

The sound design by Duramaney Kamara could be turned up a notch for added tension, but instead arrives in short bursts. Lighting, by Peter Small, is used sparingly too, and often we’re essentially listening to the three perform a live, largely static reading. With the script feeling literary in its construction, the production could benefit from dialing up its theatricality.

Still, the effect of this hourlong play is hard to ignore, and you leave with a sour, disgusted taste in your mouth. Over the course of a year, the residents repeatedly reach out to their housing manager to alert them to number 61’s absence. But no one seems to care. Little is shared between the neighbours beyond the occasional hello or complaint on their WhatsApp group. These are people fading into the background, systematically forgotten. In its gloom and disconnection, this becomes a topical moral tale for our times.

Maggots is at the Bush Theatre to 28 February. Book Maggots tickets on LondonTheatre.co.uk

Photo credit: Maggots (Photos by Ross Kernahan)