Top Gs Like Me review – Dark comedy sees Andrew Tate-style influencer take on wrestlers, health gurus and sexual assault | platform

TThe audience enters through a tunnel painted on the walls in one corner of the lobby. Inside, the hall is a life-size skate park. It’s a feat of set design by Rebecca Brewer and tremendous atmosphere. The play is a blast of freshness too. Written by emerging local talent Samson Hawkins, the film is a dark comedy about toxic masculinity and the lure of misogynistic online influencer culture for young people struggling to find their place in the world. In this case, it’s 18-year-old Aidan (Daniel Rainsford), who struggles with low-paying jobs and feels helpless while his beloved girlfriend Mia (Fanta Barry) prepares for university and begins a romance with the taller, wealthier Charlie (Finn Samuels).

At its center is an Andrew Tate-style misogynist turned social media Svengali, Hugo Bang (Danny Hatchard, of EastEnders fame). Dressed in a devilishly soft red suit, he emerges from the social media snippets Aidan scrolls through, which are filmed in a dramatic way, but he slowly begins to gain attention until he enters into a direct dialogue with Aidan.

The text weaves together themes of class, male mental health, teenage angst, and sexual assault. It bears some echoes of Jack Thorne’s “adolescence”, although black humor is prevalent here, and not every case is investigated in sufficient depth.

But he makes his point, and gradually gets creepier. Directed by Jesse Jones, the TikTok-type videos are acted out on stage, appearing and disappearing with each swipe of Aidan’s fingers. It features wrestlers, health experts, Encels’ music, a “Queen Liz” rap song (with Phillip as her baby daddy), a band dancing to Lisa’s Money, Taylor Swift’s The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived, and more. It produces a hallucinatory effect, with lighting (designed by Rory Beaton) and sound (by Benjamin Grant) bringing drama and satirical wit.

Some of the characters are drawn quite crudely, such as Charlie, who skews Rogers clichés, and local alcoholic Dave (David Shall from TV’s The Inbetweeners). The plot is a bit heavy handed and moral lessons are spoken but this does not detract from the play’s glow of good ideas and enthusiastic performances.

Just this week, the director of the National Theatre, Indu Rubasingham, spoke of the dearth of new writing and warned against risk-averse theatrical work in a public lecture. Featuring a group of young performers including a chorus of 25 University of Northampton acting students, this production reflects a commitment to nurturing new talent and feels brave about it.