Popular reviews

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  Review by loureviews ★★★½

  'Plaintiffs and Defendants' was the first of a pair of plays written by Simon Gray for the Play for Today series in 1975. Both plays share the same casts but in different roles, some mirroring each other - a fascinating idea.

  This play introduces us to Peter, a solicitor who is embroiled in a case of child custody. His wife Hilary is remote and irritated with him and their life together with teenage son Jeremy, while out of hours Peter has been carrying on with the unstable Joanna. The other characters are Charlie and Alison (who we don't actually see as such), friends of long-standing of Peter's, and Sallust, a quiet and dour legal pupil of Peter's who can easily…

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  Review by Richmond_Hill ★★★

  There’s engagement in the part - some articulately phrased scenes - but as a whole this is under-heated stuff remaining a series of relationship cause-and-effects that could easily be reordered and still have a similar net outcome (just as this play can precede or succeed its sister piece, Two Sundays).

  That the mechanics of play/scene construction seem more important than storytelling might indicate where Gray’s concerns were located but they only cooly translate to the screen whatever they were.

  Fortunately Bates cruises through with ease as the smoothly beleaguered Peter, but even that has a low gas mark feel about it.