The Night Before Christmas
Southwark Playhouse

HEARD the one about the loser, the gay and the prostitute in a storeroom? Add an imprisoned elf and there you have Anthony Neilson’s 1995 play, an extended joke running to just over an hour.

Neilson's trio comprises Loser Gary, played with a winning child-like naivety by Douggie McMeekin, who's a divorced trader in dodgy goods and unlikely to be able to see his son over the holiday period. His mate Simon (Michael Salami), a cynically angry gay, is set on vociferously denouncing the plasticity of Christmas, while a foul-mouthed prostitute (Unique Spencer) is out to get a Power Rangers toy for her son whatever the cost.

Don Starkey’s elf, working for an international gift agency out of Hartlepool, is caught breaking into Gary’s lockup and is forced to give away the secrets of Christmas and grant three wishes in order to be released. That in a nutshell is Neilson’s exploration of Christmas through three sets of very jaded eyes.