The Scratcher – Dublin Fringe Festival – Review
by Frank L

The Scratcher written and performed by Kelly Shatter

PERFORMANCES  – 12 – 15 September  – 18:00, €13/€11
OTHER PERFORMANCES  – 16 September  – 15:30, €13/€11
Venue – Bewley’s Café Theatre
Duration – 60mins

The stage is empty apart from two boxes which interlink, one about a metre high and the other slightly smaller. These along with innumerable scratch cards are the only props which Shatter needs to describe Nicole’s addictive obsession with scratch cards and how they dominate her life to the exclusion of all else. Well nearly all else. Nicole is “a fledgling bisexual” according to the programme notes.

The story begins at a petrol filling station where Nicole is filling the tank while her new girlfriend Eve sits in the car. Nicole and Eve manage to conduct a conversation while Nicole fills the tank. Nicole uses the nozzle in a suggestive manner. While Eve may be her new girlfriend, Nicole makes clear she is not averse to flaunting the phallic symbolism of the nozzle of the petrol pump. At the cash till Nicole cannot help but notice the mass of scratch cards. The cashier is suitably tight-lipped. Nicole succumbs and finds herself addictively buying a stash of them and hiding them in the back pocket of her ripped jeans. We are now firmly in the world of addictive behaviour, as she is unable to resist them but is also determined to hide her actions. Nicole is a pure scratch card addict and pooh-poohs those who use a coin to scratch a card while she, a purist, uses her nails. It is Eve’s birthday and there is a celebration planned, but just before the guests arrive, Nicole dreams up a most unlikely excuse to leave briefly in order to feed her addictive habit. Nicole goes then on a roller coaster adventure and encounters all sorts including a down-and-out and a guard.

As the sole performer on stage, Shatter is adept at conducting conversations between two people, which often includes a man. She is also clever at creating comedy out of very little. Eve it transpires is very tall and Nicole is on the small side. Shatter has a comic sequence as to how Nicole and Eve first came to kiss. It is only one of the many improbable but funny situations that Shatter has created in her lively script.

Shatter is blessed with a great deal of physical energy when she is on stage. She moves around, and over the boxes, and even tries to get into one of them! It is all high energy and a great deal of fun to watch. All the time she keeps up conversations with the various characters she meets.  Shatter had the audience in the palm of her hand.