REVIEW: BIG SHOES by Rowan Williams at The Hope Theatre 8 – 12 July 2025
“The dialogue stings and quips” ★★★★
In his debut play BIG SHOES, Rowan Williams has created two male characters that understand how to talk about their feelings. And talk about their feelings they do: sadly, lovingly, hot-headedly. Two brothers lose their father – who was a clown (“both metaphorically and literally”) – and struggle in the wake of his death to realise their careers as comedians amongst the pressures of family, poverty and self-esteem. Their double act, the K-Hole Surgery, keeps them close as brothers, but when Jay (Rowan Williams) announces he’s leaving comedy to look after his new family, Tom (Luke Sumner) falls apart. The brothers fluctuate between love and resentment for one another, and Williams cleverly constructs a co-dependent relationship that survives alcoholism, grief and suicidal ideation. I’m making the play sound macabre. It’s not – it’s hilarious, and Luke Sumner is electric as the wild, self-important young comedian who can make a joke out of anything but will never fill his father’s big (clown) shoes.
Longlisted for the Theatre503 International Playwriting Award, Williams’ play excels in its nuanced portrayal of a fraternal relationship that – despite being knocked about from all corners – always returns to a shared centre. The dialogue stings and quips as one brother leans on the other and we fully understand that they are – in life as in their double act – the “full half of the other person’s world”. Williams’ script is expertly composed, offering a unique ‘palette cleanser’ before the final, explosive scene. Sumner breaks character and riffs with the audience, as if performing his own stand-up gig, and manages to lead an orchestra of noise in canon without causing too much embarrassment among the audience, which, in London, is no small feat.
Amid absurd portrayals of comedy characters such as the ‘Ham Paedophile,’ Williams carves a symbol of the brothers’ father into the play: his red clown nose. At times, Jay can’t bring himself to touch it; at others, he tries to snatch it off of Tom. The red nose seems to act as a kind of permission from their father: a license to fully embrace comedy and all that comes with it. Whether that’s a wise idea is questioned throughout the play, as it explores alcoholism, depression and the feeling of always being the underdog: “In comedy, as in life, you are still an amateur.”
While the production perhaps could have pushed further, both Summer and Williams match the script’s brilliance in a play that is equal parts honest, vulnerable and funny.
BIG SHOES by Rowan Williams
Autonymic Theatre co-production with Isabelle Kirk
The Hope Theatre
8th – 12th July 2025
Box office: https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/whats-on/207-upper-street/the-hope-theatre/big-shoes/e-mobkaj
CREATIVE
Director – Tom Greaves
Stage Manager – Bea Hart
CAST
Younger – Luke Sumner
Older – Rowan Williams
Social media: @autonymictheatre; @rowantwilliams; @flukesummer; @tdrgreaves
