Bad Boys Stick Together

I’ve got tired cheeks from grinning. I went to see Christian Slater in Swimming with Sharks last night, I like seeing my heroes on stage and I’ve always had a bit of a soft spot for Christian.

The play is about the cut-throat world of film making where everyone is out for themselves and will lie, cheat, steal and even kill to get to the top.

Taken from IMDb: “A young Hollywood executive becomes the assistant to a big time movie producer who is the worst boss imaginable: abusive, abrasive and cruel. But soon things turn around when the young executive kidnaps his boss and visits all the cruelties back on him.”

Christian, as Buddy, the big boss, has a lovely time stomping around shouting at people, throwing things and issuing some very clever put downs. His co-stars Matt Smith and Helen Baxendale are also superb in their roles as Guy, the hapless assistant, and Dawn, the ambitious screenwriter who has apparently “screwed her way to the top”(the script isn’t without it’s misogynist content.)

At first Guy is keen to please his new boss and runs his errands without question, but soon he grows tired of the abuse and falls under the spell of Dawn, with whom he starts an affair. When Christian, sorry, BUDDY, encourages Guy to go against Dawn’s wishes and the couple split up, Guy goes a bit bonkers do-dah and breaks into Buddy’s home to get his revenge.

I think the next scene was my favourite, Christian, his character now being tortured and tied to a gym machine, had his arms gaffer taped out in a Jesus Christ pose, but still carried on gesturing wildly with his hands, using movement to accentuate the point of every sentence he was making.

There even seemed to be a moment of weakness when Buddy talked of his ex-wife being murdered and remembered the great times they’d had together. But, of course, it was all just a lie.

He’d even manipulated Dawn to appear at that moment so the crazy scene got even more messy. There was a sudden blackout then a shooting, and you’re left for a minute not knowing the outcome. I don't want to spoil the plot, so let’s just say you can’t keep a bad man down.

After the show, Toby told me a great story about Christian being a real-life bad man. Apparently he went along to Spiegeltent when Ursula Martinez was appearing and was so drunk and obnoxious that he got thrown out. Then a few weeks later his PA called her and asked her to perform at his birthday party. She said, “Sure, the fee will be XXX pounds,” and they told her, “Oh no, you won’t be paid!” Ha! Cheeky monkey. She told ‘em where to stuff it.