‘Skewered’ is an off-beat dark comedy with lashes of horror and a dash of musical numbers. A Lamplight Production directed by Nick Ray Rutter and co-written with Ben Richardson and brother Noah Rutter, it is an unexpected tale of shame, infidelity and a couple’s doomed relationship, enveloped within a juicy, meat-filled wrap – the glorious doner kebab. Born of real-life events, the film is sure to delight, assault and tickle your senses all at once.
Opposing sexual appetites and dietary ethics bring a stagnant relationship to a theatrical and surprising crescendo as a heartfelt revelation confronts the elephant in the room.
The essential premise is one we know only too well, a relationship which has lost its dewey glow and a couple stuck in a rut. So then ask yourself, what is the quintessential move for a partner in trouble…why to cheat, of course! However ‘Skewered’ offers a twisted take on fidelity. Magnus, our hapless bumbling male protagonist, nervously paces around his candle-lit flat as crooning romantic songs play in the background, only to be rudely disturbed by his girlfriend who comes home unexpectedly after forgetting her concert ticket. Rutter perfectly sets the tension from the very start, and we immediately settle into this world he has constructed and enjoy the ensuing drama.
Nothing is as it seems in ‘Skewered’. We soon discover Magnus isn’t waiting for a lover but instead a dripping, juicy kebab – forbidden to him as a seemingly stalwart vegetarian. His girlfriend Fleur, when she eventually realsies what is going on, doesn’t react in the way one would expect, seemingly accepting her partner’s choice as the disappointment and disgust for him plays all over her face. The musical number at the end seamlessly captures the protagonists’ twisted feelings towards each other and the life they lead…the kebab really isn’t the issue.
The characters are so whole within themselves and the world they live in thanks to the captivating performances by Hanako Footman and Graham Dickson. Magnus doesn’t want to be this way – he doesn’t want to be afflicted by a gnawing craving for grease and meat and Dickson understands this and plays it all out in his awkward movements and apologetic mumblings. Fleur understands his predicament, yet seems incapable of accepting it and Footman is brilliant at playing an unlikable woman, indifferent to her partner’s drowning but also battling her own struggles.
One of the stars of the show is the mise-en scène, which includes a lived-in and welcoming flat full of meticulously chosen items, making it a perfectly-fitting place for the drama to unfold. . A special mention goes to the all-important lacklustre fridge which we see Magnus staring into woefully with such effect in the opening sequence. Everything serves to enhance the narration in this brilliantly tense comedy. As it charms audiences on the festival circuit, we can only imagine the squeals of laughter and enraptured faces as audiences revel in this guilty pleasure.
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