Skip to main content
Time and Tide, Park Theatre London
INDIE PURCELL recommends a new play depicting the lives within a crumbling community dealing with change
Nemo and Daz

JAMES McDERMOTT’S charming new play Time and Tide picks apart the lives of a small community in Norfolk, coming to terms with, or struggling to face, change.

Set in a small, run-down cafe at the end of Cromer pier (an authentic and realistic set design by Caitlin Abbott), McDermott’s own experiences of working in a cafe in Norfolk helped him develop his storyline and characters, spending his days “watching people and listening to what they weren’t saying to each other which taught me lots about human interaction and subtext,” he tells us in the author’s note.

It’s not a particularly unusual story — young cafe worker Nemo, who is gay, is leaving Norfolk for the bright lights and sights of London. His boss May, a surrogate mother figure, is toying with the idea of selling up her cafe as customers turn to Costa and other chain coffee places, while Nemo’s best friend Daz is finding it hard to accept that Nemo’s leaving — more, as we find out in the second half of the play, than he’s willing to admit.

Morning Star call for advertising
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
More from this author
bee
Music Review / 17 January 2023
17 January 2023
alice
Theatre Review / 12 December 2022
12 December 2022
Online: Peaceophobia
Theatre Review / 8 September 2022
8 September 2022
While the subject matter is sobering and serious, this isn't your run-of-the-mill polemic, write INDIE PURCELL
AG
Book Review / 21 August 2022
21 August 2022
An absolute must for those who love film and graphic novels, writes INDIANNA PURCELL