Theatre Review; Innit Is A Gut-Wrenching Look Into Growing Up Poor
Synopsis: Meet Kelly Roberts as she visits a psychologist. She’s bold, vulgar…and broken. You’ll laugh blindly to heartfelt tears! Powerful, sell-out one-woman show Innit, set during working class, 90’s Manchester, demonstrates the teenage angst and wilted heart of the outrageous, guffaw-inducing Kelly Roberts. Witness her first ever visit to a psychologist as she unwittingly discloses her hilarious and heart-breaking story, leaving a mark on those who remember those isolating teenage year.
When you read about Innit, it promises to break your hearts within its straight 75 minutes. This is a high promise that I, kind of, thought was BS. I have seen and heard many plays that promised to tear my heart strings, but Innit actually did. Playing at the Soho Playhouse, Innit feels like a hidden giant.
Brilliantly written, directed, and starred by Irish actress Colette Forde, Innit starts out like a play about a sassy, “wankerish” high school student named Kelly Roberts. She has got a potty mouth, a quick tongue, and more chips on her shoulder than a Lay’s factory. By all means, she would be considered a “chav” back in Manchester; where she is going to highschool and gets into many fights. Being the “immigrant” of the school, she is bullied for her accent and her economic status. Thus, at first, you might laugh at Kelly’s lack of etiquette and unflinching toss of a dirty, sex joke. In this world, the poor become jokes and symbols of human indignity, but Innit is a play that reveals it is not easy to keep self-love and hope when you simply cannot afford to live.
There I was sitting down, my eyes gazing into Kelly’s crackling, emotional break as she realizes that she is inheriting her mother’s impoverished life. She probably will date men that mistreat or lessen her value into sex favors; she, actually, already has. She probably will not runaway to Spain, and become a premier singer and dancer who can buy chocolate cookies whenever she wants; something the teen does not even have a few bucks to get. Even writing that last statement guts me like a fish, especially because, if you notice, Kelly’s shoes have holes in them and her school uniform was missing a button. This little detail leaped out to poke into my quiet wounds, and ponder about the carried humiliations of many poor children who wish they could have even the simplest, nice thing like, a cool backpack.
I remember going to high school, and seeing kids made fun of if they could not afford a trendy bag or if their shoes had holes. I remember hanging out with my friends by their stoops, and going to Wendy’s when we felt like “splurging” on a meal. Moreover, I remember the nights I cried feeling like being pretty, cool, and “cultured” was the most expensive, exclusive thing I could never have as a teenaged girl. Forde’s Kelly goes through ALL these emotions and realities to show that it is not just the working class employee that struggles, but the kid he or she leaves home to assure she is fed meal but…..can’t get a chocolate cookie.
I know what you are thinking… chocolate cookie? Yet, you will surprised how many little no’s chip at your soul, and could make you resent your poor, working parents. This is what happens to to teenage Kelly; whose mother’s economic status has led her through a life of many “can’t haves”. The only time she got gifts was during Christmas, and she had to pick from the 10 dollar or less section of a catalogue. Those things warp the young girl’s mind into being a pit of anger, sadness, and an over-eagerness to prove she is NOT someone to be duped or mess with. You see this type of behavior in newsreel close-ups of poor people attacking immigrants or those on welfare, despite being both, because we attack who we are to feel closer to who we want to be: even if that tactic does not work.
Collete Forde is MAGNIFICENT as Kelly Roberts. She grasps the emotional and physical awkwardness of being a young, human being with really adult problems. When you are a poor kid, you are not as shielded from hard times and you might not be as coddled. Kelly longs to be hugged by her mom, and wishes that she was more overtly loving. Instead, her mom is overworked, underpaid, and trying to heal her own wounds at being a single mom. Thus, although Innit can be hilariously witty, its strength lies in its ability to show the everyday tragedy of economically “getting by” but dreaming of stability. For More Information On Innit Click Here. To Buy Tickets. Soho Playhouse is located 15 Vandam St, New York, NY 10013.
