Chav Scum Kills God is a refreshing new play by talented writer Drew Davies. It’s billed as ‘a devilish new comedy’, but it hits deep. Davies’ style is reminiscent of a young Philip Pullman. This is quality work, with signs of the promise of much, much greater things to come. The storyline is original, but draws on contemporary social issues and classic themes, including various interpretations of the Faust story, Dante’s Divine Comedy and the hero’s quest.

Bradley Benjamin plays the part of the streetwise protagonist, Chaverston Robert Scumthorpe, Jr., who’s no stranger to petty crime. Unaware that recent events have led to his death, his change of status is communicated gradually to him by Michael Lindall, who plays ‘The Other’, a fiendish being in the guise of a medical orderly, in a neutral, white hospital setting. We follow Chav’s journey as he gradually reconstructs the events which led to his recent death, then goes through various stages of denial, hysteria, relief, curiosity, regrets, non-acceptance, and finally, acceptance of his situation.

 

He is reunited with his father, Robert, Sr. (played by Des Brittain) and told that rather than them being in heaven, they’re in hell. Robert, Sr. describes hell as what you make of it and he’s decided to make it ‘the retirement he never had’. Losing none of the time that doesn’t exist in eternity, he’s decided to connive and scheme to climb up the social hierarchy of hell (having a little fun along the way). Aspiring to bring about an underground revolution in the afterlife, he gives his son an assignment, couched in socialist terms: Go off and assassinate God. Brainwashed painfully into obedience and having bought into the argument that ‘when you’re already dead, what have you got to lose?’, as well as not wanting to disappoint his father, Chav goes off to fulfil his quest.

 

He trudges through a middle ground between hell and paradise, with a timer (in this production an old fashioned mechanical alarm clock) attached to a bundle of dynamite positioned on his chest. Davies cleverly construes this middle ground as a heartland, littered with detritus of life, in which the audience are clearly positioned. Davies’ production values clearly position this externalised landscape as a metaphor for the internal battlefield of the heart, where good and evil constantly vie for supremacy. This is where Chav meets the character of Lou, a dried-out American down and out tramp-come-hippie, played stylishly by Jonathan Hansler, who challenges him to a game of cards. Naïvely, Chav accepts, with Lou comically exacting a forfeit from him – to be repaid at a later stage – then puts him on the path towards the pearly gates.

 

The second half of the play opens in a scene which mirrors the first – an anteroom, with an orderly, again played by Michael Lindall. This time, however, when interacting with the other ‘Other’, Chav experiences extreme ecstasy – which throws him completely. Challenged through direct experience, his assumptions and beliefs radically confronted, yet still mindful of his quest, he ends up on his knees, and summons The Divine Presence.

 

In answer to his prayers, he receives what he least expects. He comes face to face with God – in the guise of Kathy, his girlfriend, played by Sarah Alborn. Chav’s ‘Divine Beatrice’ appears as a larger-than-life Barbie figure, who complements Chav’s Burberry hilariously. In Davies’ vision, heaven is the ultimate polis, in which all the inhabitants get a chance to take on the persona of God. Kathy-God tells Chav the story of her demise, a dark element which adds poignancy to the comic way in which the heavenly situation is depicted. Kathy-God is depicted by Davies as a fascinating composite – as Chav’s beloved, she is reminiscent of Dante’s Beatrice; as a female figure of perfection, she is also reminiscent of Eve before the fall, yet in a passage which brings up parallels with the conclusion of Voltaire’s Candide, she talks of taking on an Adamic role of cultivating her garden in paradise.

 

The omniscient Kathy-God discloses the fact that she knows what he has been sent to do. Thus, Chav is confronted with a dilemma – does he destroy that which he loves most? And what is it that he loves? Is it his father’s idea of ‘standards and equality’? Is it his love for Kathy? Or is it a sense of something deeper? Davies skilfully draws the audience in through empathic dialogue and direction as the play seemingly draws to a close, and Chav goes through a spiritual rebirth, not in a noisy, evangelistic, arm-flinging, ‘Hallelujah-chanting’ way, but a quick and witty flash, which is the culmination of a quiet, internal process of self-developmental transformation, which is all the more poignant for being understated.

 

The transformation takes him back to hell, where he confronts his father, and his Faustian forfeit is called up in a comic climax, which starts with shaving cream, and which ends in a scene in which cream pies flying about the stage would fit perfectly. There is a powerful parallel between internal and external battlefields here. An important line in the play, enunciated by both Lou-Lucifer and Kathy-God is ‘the fight for your soul doesn’t end when you die. It begins in earnest’. The comic way the battle is externalised symbolically on the stage adds significantly to the poignancy. On the one hand, the battle is seen to be destructive; on the other, it is a struggle which leads to the sprouting of a seed, the development of new and positive growth. It is beautiful and intangible.

 

The production is complemented by specially-composed incidental music composed by Alexandros Miaris which brilliantly underscores Michael Lindall’s performances as the two ‘Others’, and is worthy of special mention.

 

The best part of the show is Drew Davies’ writing, which has the potential to lead people naturally to something they are meant to find deep within themselves. Contemporary issues of love and sexuality are delineated with insight and depth. The script is full of humour and manages to capture the fragile essence of what it is to be fully human, fully sentient, fully alive, fully responsible; without shying away from depicting the sacrifices and pain which are part and parcel of that process.