Review: YOU & IT, King’s Head Theatre

Photo credit: Danny Kaan

You & It begins with something deceptively sweet. Mina and Gyujin are a young couple in love, expecting their first child and looking towards a future together. Then, within moments, Mina is killed in a road accident and Gyujin is left trying to hold onto the life they had. Written by Seoeun Oh and Q Lee, with music by Q Lee, English lyrics by Ricky Allan and directed by Esther Jun, this musical explores grief, memory and the question of whether technology can ever recreate the person we have lost.

The premise sits less in traditional science fiction and more in the increasingly familiar territory of AI and the question of whether a machine can be human. There are echoes of Her, Blade Runner and even the supernatural idea of Ghost, but You & It never quite finds a new way into these ideas.

Zachary Pang as Gyujin portrays a man drowned in grief and rose-tinted memories of a life he once had and could have had. There is an understandable desperation in Gyujin's desire to recreate Mina, but the performance feels forced at times and the emotional connection to the material doesn't always land.

Understudy Lucy Park, performing as Mina at this performance, brings perhaps the most life to the production. As the AI version of Mina, she finds an empathy in a character searching for some sense of control while ultimately remaining at the disposal of her husband's will. The idea of Gyujin being able to turn her on and off whenever he is inconvenienced opens up something much more uncomfortable about control, ownership and relationships.

Unfortunately, this is where You & It feels like it is only scratching the surface of what it could be saying. There is nothing particularly new in the central premise, but it opens up plenty of contemporary avenues around loneliness, control and what it means to possess a version of someone you have lost. Instead, many of the choices feel too convenient, keeping the audience at a distance from the more confronting possibilities.

The traditional dynamic between the male and female characters is also interesting. There is nothing inherently wrong with exploring these values, but for a story set in the near future, the relationship can feel strangely stuck in the past. Even the pregnancy introduced at the beginning is barely acknowledged again, leaving an element of the story that feels more like a set-up than something that meaningfully shapes what follows.

The music is nicely arranged, but many of the songs blend into one another without enough differentiation. The musicians are excellent, but the score doesn't always give the performers enough variety to build the emotional journey. Ultimately, the human connection between the performers and the material is missing, even when the subject matter itself is asking us to consider exactly what makes us human.

There are elements of the production that are much more successful. Bob Sterrett and Lu Herbert's set design creates a lovely, earthy and homely environment, while the movement around the space keeps the two-hander visually active. The intimate setting suits the scale of the story, even if the production doesn't always make enough theatrical use of it.

There is something genuinely interesting and juicy somewhere inside You & It. The idea of grief turning into control, and love becoming something that can be switched on and off, could make for something far more unsettling. But too often, the production settles for the obvious rather than pushing into the uncomfortable places its premise opens up.

There are good ideas here, but they need more courage to become fully realised.

** Two stars

Reviewed by: Stephanie Osztreicher

You & It plays at London’s King’s Head Theatre until 26 Sep, with tickets available here.