The Man

Anna Sokolova

Sep 29

2 min read

★★★★

Presented by @jbtheatreco

https://jbtheatreco.com/

Old Fitz Hotel Theatre, the second run for toSydney Fringe 2026

21 September - 2 October

The review

Somewhere in London, Ben is getting ready to submit his first tax return. He is alone at a large desk with several recognizable paper forms and two boxes, marked as “expenses” and “not expenses”. There is also a small, cheap sofa in the back corner, with a tall, cozy yellow light near it, and that is all. A small room squeezed onto the stage with extensive set-up for the main-season show.

Nervous, anxious, intimidated by each question in the papers, Ben (Mike Howlett), slightly squeezing a small old-fashioned mobile, luckily easily reaches the tax help line, connecting to Lisa (Claudia Leon). Lisa is a well-trained, polite assistant, and her warm, soft and understanding tone makes her a comforting companion to Ben, who keeps ringing to talk to her for yet another piece of advice. This business-related temporary connection adds a snug tone to the play, when from snippets of personal comments it is clear how lonely Lisa is, too.

Ben has a complex job. He collects receipts from the audience, telling a story about each of them. These real pieces of paper are randomly distributed every evening, so the flow of the story is never the same.

“The Man” is an unusually linear play that requests attention to each memory, large, small, tragic, funny, sentimental, bittersweet, sad. It all is a journey into the past, where there is nothing to change or anticipate, only to remember… Told in detail or quickly mentioned. Boring or intriguing. But there is never a high point to reach; instead here is a pleasure in following each piece of this puzzle. Howlett admirably travels the randomised path, taking a very justifiable move, a quick pause to plunge into the next bit. Who among us will not take a second to recall where one or another receipt was obtained and what it was about?

Howlett plays with vivid mimics composed from subtle moves - a quick straight look, a glance down, a smile with the corners of his lips, a longer stare into space; hands together, nervous fingers, or open shoulders standing straight up; leaning on the table, and once, filling lungs with air as getting ready to say something important and uneasy, stopping himself before saying a word, lowering a receipt he was holding into the “not expenses” box.

It is a story framed by taxes, but it is about a human, someone's everyday life, crocheted from so recognisable bits and pieces. It is private and universal simultaneously. Otherwise, why would we reflect that smile, or would our hearts squeeze together with that man on the stage?