Blink

The fourth character in Blink, the absent father, is represented by an empty hospital bed. The characters talk about him, about the way he sometimes blinks to communicate. Now, the father has little to do with the play, but that idea of talking laboriously through blinks stuck with me when trying to describe Ian Rowlands's play, for that's how it comes across. Blink's series of artificial monologues and scenes are rarely linked together by the aggressive push-and-pull energy it needs, and so the words all come across as deliberate and overdone. There are some good moments from Sion Pritchard, who plays an abused son, but only when he's speaking directly to Rhian Blythe, who plays his first love. It's a shame so much of the play focuses on things other than that relationship, for without focus, the blinks mean nothing.

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