FringeReview UK 2025
All the Happy Things
SH Productions
Genre: Contemporary, Dark Comedy, Drama, Short Plays, Theatre
Festival: FringeReview UK
Low Down
Emily, her sister Sienna finds, is terminally annoying. She won’t let her alone, declares Sienna having sex with her boyfriend in their shared living room is gross. But what’s Emily even doing there looking on? Naomi Denny’s 2020 Tony Craze award-winning All the Happy Things premieres at Soho Theatre directed by Lucy Jane Atkinson till April 26th, with Denny as Sienna.
It’s impossible to believe Sienna doesn’t believe Emily’s not part of this at some level, and by the end, you’ll think so too.
Review
Emily, her sister Sienna finds, is terminally annoying. She won’t let her alone, declares Sienna having sex with her boyfriend in their shared living room is gross. But what’s Emily even doing there looking on? It’s easy for Emily: she’s dead, challenges Sienna “Then why am I here?” Naomi Denny’s 2020 Tony Craze award-finalist All the Happy Things premieres at Soho Theatre directed by Lucy Jane Atkinson till April 26th, with Denny as Sienna.
Brighton-based Denny is known for featuring in Jed Mercurio’s Chantelle (ITV), and her short plays about Black women – respectively breast cancer, and identity: Unseen, Unheard and Essentially Black. Denny’s developed All the Happy Things through the Soho programme: there’s fingerprints of ambiguity. Emily, Sienna’s elder (acting younger) sister is dead. Originally that wasn’t clear. Now it’s straightforward but carries the DNA of that ambiguity to make a visceral, tangible 75-minute play.
Emily, and briefly Emily’s ex Ruby (a naggingly funny – and boppy – LJ Johnson) joins Denny: whose Sienna is so good at multi-tasking she has little time for grief. Denny exudes the sovereign calm of an actor/writer who radiates the part out of her. It’s a naturalistic masterclass.
All the Happy Things is mostly a double-act dark comedy about tragedy. To Denny’s straight Sienna, Johnson’s excellent at suggesting why Sienna calls Emily “selfish”, twirling and freezing at a panicky traffic blare that Sienna emulates in synch on occasion. It’s a spooky moment – shout out for Yemurai Zvayara’s movement direction here. Emily’s forever 25, though Sienna’s three years younger (this doesn’t quite fit: Denny plays responsible elder, though it hardly matters). Maybe it’s because Emily’s born June 6th: that birthday’s looming (her Dad remembers it, never Sienna’s).
Denny’s joined by Dejon Mullings playing warm, supportive, often pushed-away boyfriend Sam, and it’s-your-choice-but-don’t-even try-to smiling line manager Kevin. Mullings alternates wise, conflict-avoiding, not conflict-averse Sam: who packs a surprise much later, with a neat plot tie-in. And as egregious Kevin, Mullings is a horrible amped-up smiled-on switch, not letting Sienna get a word in.
Making a playlist of Emily life is difficult: everything was wiped by their Mum (voiceover Lydia King, also Helen, who’s mysteriously remote, we’re not told why) when Emily died. There’s a hint they have different mothers, but the Mum role is obscured.
These “happy things” are lists though: the title shows how impossible such google fixes are in summing up a life. “We toasted her memory in a glass of wine. She would have hated it” Sienna quips. But how can you recapture and let go at the same time? It’s what makes Denny’s play, as well as performance, so compelling in its anatomy of grief as a presence: Emily as a hungry ghost, suddenly gone without a goodbye, so ever-present.
Dad (voiceover Patrick Mckenzie, also briefly friend Clive) now in a care home, thinks Sienna’s Emily. He thinks Sienna’s presents are Emily’s too, further spooking Sienna. But worse comes as his condition deteriorates and to further amplify Sienna’s stress ‘Militant’ Maggie, exasperated care home supervisor (Rowena Lennon), brings ultimatums. These voiceovers are fuzzy: they could be clearer. Sound designer and composer Eamonn O’Dwyer is elsewhere synched and atmospheric, composing a Max Richter-like riff on Bach’s famous Prelude in C. Elsewhere designer Jida Akil allows the Soho Upstars space to flow with suggestions and very few props, where Abi Turner’s lighting does much of the work.
You begin to wonder how tail-spinning Sienna’s life will get, but this is realism, not tragic conspiracy. And funny. Nevertheless, Kevin more or less orders Sienna on leave after the incompetent white male worker Andrew whom Kevin foisted on her, screws up and Sienna gets the blame. Mullings is compelling on permanent transmit so Sienna’s cornered. Emily can never understand why, as responsible Sienna explains, the corporate world won’t allow Sienna to declare she can’t be burdened with a malfunctioning white male, who can never be at fault. It’s touched on but clearly a theme worth developing.
“When you sister dies, you’re not a sister any more… but you are” Sienna concludes of Emily. But she’s not entirely alone. As there’s a warm moment with Emily’s ex, Ruby (Johnson in more relaxed mode) whom Emily ended with for no reason two weeks before her own sudden death. When they bond over Emily’s parody of Sienna’s looking out for a posh “Rieeesling” as wine choice, Emily can get jealous about Ruby too. But nothing takes away laughter shared with Ruby, as when Sienna recalls the sisters dismantled ball bearings, hid them from each other in increasingly frantic places and one’s discovered by Mum in the grandmother’s ashes. Then there’s the Mini Cheddar moment.
Finally though, it’s for the sisters to decide. How to navigate. It’s impossible to believe Sienna doesn’t believe Emily’s not part of this at some level, and by the end, you’ll think so too. Highly recommended
Production Manager Daniel Steward
Dramaturg Somebody Jones, Stage Manager Kate Tregear, Drama Therapist Samantha Adams, Producer Steph Hartland.
