All the Rest

All the Rest explores these options - specifically in the character of young visual artist James (Anna Kaleeda) desperate for an exhibition of their work at the oh-so-hip and fashionable Abboetöir Gallery.  Is James talented?  Or part of all the rest?  Who knows?  Burdened if not debilitated by a recent break-up, it’s not clear if James believes in their talent – that is without others believing in it.  Anna Kaleeda’s quiet, reticent but sweet performance (marred a little by mumbling) increases the tension: will their proposal be accepted, will they get what they want – that is, the sort of, kind of recognition they try to believes they deserve?

The gallery is where the story starts.  We, the audience, are welcomed by the smug, confident gallery owner (the program doesn’t say who plays what) who delivers first a brisk but standard Welcome to Country and makes it sound even more like obligatory cant than it usually does.  He also suggests we admire the art works on display – although we can only see one small work and all the rest, all black, are either an hommage to Pierre Soulage or just… all black.  There’s a handbill on every seat with a bio of ‘this week’s artist’, who is (of course) a graduate of the Berghain, Berlin, and who was once described as The Millennial Rothko…  The arbitrary nature of success is emphasised by Hayley Browne as ‘this week’s artist’ with a faux modest, boldly meaningless little speech – which is naturally even more frustrating for James.

We, the audience, become the art lovers, freeloaders or rubberneckers at the gallery opening, as we later become the other guests at the four dispiriting house parties James and their gay friend from school (an edgy, deliberately irritating performance from playwright Finn McGrath) mooch along to that night - thus implicating us in this world (our world, after all).  With some key (but perhaps unnecessary) flashbacks, All the Rest observes a kind of unity of time: it all happens on the one night. 

The gallery is humiliating and bewildering enough, but at those parties, we watch James’ gay friend go from encouraging them to abandoning them, and we wince at their awkward interactions with many others (the cast brilliantly doubling up) who have no interest in James anyway, and we realise that James may lack the necessary people skills to ‘network’… 

At the end, James gets some important, crucial advice, the sort of advice any real artist might take to heart, but will James take it to heart?

All the Rest is a sharply observed slice of contemporary sub-culture life – witty, cynical, poignant, but never for a moment sentimental.  As well as being constantly entertaining, with its pointed, funny mix of all-too-recognisable character types, it’s also close to satire as it asks some discomforting questions about getting ahead, about ‘success’ and how to make it.  Here too is an excellent cast given excellent, clever, pointed dialogue – which might well be enhanced if some of the cast were to be less naturalistic, less given to machine gun delivery and simply speak the dialogue clearly.  Nevertheless, this is definitely a show to see, and Finn McGrath is a smart and clear-eyed writer to watch.

Michael Brindley