Food writer’s bittersweet tale caters for foodies and non-foodies alike
Edinburgh theatre
Nigel Slater’s Toast
Traverse Theatre
In 2004, Nigel Slater – who modestly describes himself as “a cook who writes” – published a memoir that lifted the lid on a vat of long-simmering emotions.
Displaying an astute, amusing eye for the dietary limitations of the Sixties and Seventies, as well as the coming of age of his culinary sensibility (which coincided with the emergence of modern British cuisine) which led him to the Savoy, Toast detailed his early youth in Wolverhampton and later rural Worcestershire.
The least palatable aspects were the death of his asthmatic mother when he was nine, the arrival of the woman (initially the cleaner) who became his stepmother, and the difficult relationship Slater had with her and with his factory-owner father (who died three years after remarrying).
Toast became a bestseller. In 2010 it was made into a TV drama, at which point two daughters of “Mrs Potter” angrily complained that their mother (and Slater’s father) had been misrepresented. It’s possible the same accusation of distortion could be levelled against Henry Filloux-bennett’s delightful new stage adaptation. Slater’s overbearing, even brutish “Dad” (Mark Fleischmann) has been exaggerated to make him lay down the law even on which sweets are allowable for boys and he’s shorn of the book’s redeeming features. As for Mrs P, she’s an airs and graces cleaning obsessive who, in Marie Lawrence’s performance, prowls the stage with such vampish calculation you’d swear she was auditioning for the role of caricature villainess in a David Walliams story.
Everything is weighted so that we feel maximum sympathy for Sam Newton’s confidentially narrating Nigel, fresh-faced and knobbly-kneed.
Yet it’s the fidelity to the “feeling” of an upbringing that justifies the whipped-up approach. Jonnie Riordan’s production has a kindergarten playfulness that brings home the child’s perspective – the way confusion and misery sits alongside unexpected moments of hilarity.
There’s a lovely scene where the Slaters sit down to tuck into spaghetti Bolognese for the first time – with, pièce de résistance, grated Parmesan. “It smells of sick”, Nigel comments. “Yes, I know it must be off, don’t eat it!” his father grimly concludes.
This is a show you can literally taste, too. You’re handed Walnut Whips to chomp – as well as moreish samples of the lemon meringue Mrs P deploys as a weapon of war in her battle for Mr Slater’s heart. Given the Fringe’s groaning feast of theatrical edibles, I feared this curiosity might be surplus to requirements – but not at all. Foodies and non-foodies alike are well served. Tuck in! Until Aug 26. Tickets: 0131 228 1404; traverse.co.uk