Bad news of the world
Olivia Glazebrook
SECONDS OF PLEASURE by Neil LaBute Faber, £10.99, pp. 223, ISBN 057122I22X Those familiar with Neil LaBute's work will be unsurprised to read that there is absolutely no chance
of enjoying these stories; there is nothing to take pleasure or delight in. These are tales of nasty people doing horrid things to one another, to be read by all but only truly enjoyed by those who derive a malicious pleasure from the misfortune of others. The very same sort of person, in fact, who frequently pops up in LaButc's plays and films. His is a world of viciousness and cruelty, and he intends to persuade his audience of an uncomfortable truth: that viciousness and cruelty are commonplace.
LaBute's first film, In The Company of Men, was the story of two male whitecollar colleagues plotting to revenge themselves on the entire female sex by humiliating a young deaf girl. In The Shape of Things a doltish man is cruelly used by a manipulative woman. Your Friends and Neighbours exposed the disturbing secrets of 'ordinary' suburbanites. And here we have Seconds of Pleasure, a collection of 20 short stories, most of which demonstrate that men will risk everything — wife, home, family — for momentary sexual gratification. A young woman allows herself to be seduced by her estranged father who, unsuspecting, chats her up in a hotel bar; a wife catches her husband with his trunks down in the pool house; a married man obsesses over the scab on a teenage girl's leg; a woman reminisces about the summer her father murdered her sister ... you get the idea. What EaBute is trying to tell us is that this is everyday stuff: humiliation, deceit, treachery, betrayal, cowardice, cruelty, sadism — these are all happening a) in a home near you, b) in your own home, c) in your . own mind, or d) all of the above. Terrific news.
By using mostly dialogue and interior monologue LaBute intends to create an uncomfortably cramped environment in which the only frame of reference is that of his morally dubious characters. The trouble is. I still don't believe him: I don't believe that all, or even most, men are out to humiliate, betray and control women. And nor do I believe that the reverse is true. Annoyingly, according to the laws of LaBute World, this makes me a dopey, trusting innocent. (Oh well, so be it. I've been called a lot of things in my life...)
In The Shape of Things and In the Company of Men LaBute had room to present his case comprehensively. His characters were fascinating, their motives disturbing, the events horrifying yet believable. Yet here we have a series of smutty episodes with little moral impact. A huddle of dishevelled men, red-faced and redhanded? A gaggle of outraged women? Neil LaBute has been watching too much daytime TV. The male voices, so selfconsciously wicked, are more often laughable than threatening: 'I'm going to sit here all day and pray that when I swivel back around you'll be gone ... Returned to the womb of that hell from which you crawled.' Yes, dear. Take two of these with a glass of water, and we'll talk about it in the morning.
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