A fierce solo turn anchors this punchy drama about grief, grit and the fight for Olympic glory in Leytonstone’s shadow.
Director Prime Isaac sets out their stall early in Bitch Boxer, confining all the action to the ring. Partly this is practical – a ring is bulky and the Arcola studio small – but it also tells its own tale.
Chloe (Jodie Campbell) is a fighter. Even when she’s not boxing, she’s fighting. Her whole life she has put up two fists first and asked questions later.
In case the message still isn’t clear, designer Hazel Low has set up a punch bag in the corner made up – cleverly – of old jeans and shirts, like a doner kebab of compressed cast-offs. Chloe fights everywhere she goes; it is the stuff of her life.
Origins of a hard guard
The suggestion that she refashioned her hobby into her attitude aged 11 when her mother left doesn’t entirely convince. But as we meet her years later, Chloe’s motivation is clear-eyed.
She has just lost her dad and her coach. He told her, more than once, you’ve got to fight for the things you love Chloe.
Yes, Dad.
She misses him endlessly.
London 2012 on the horizon
Meanwhile, a small piece of history is happening round the corner from her Leytonstone home. It’s 2012 and the world’s sporting elite is converging on Stratford where women’s boxing will feature in the Olympics for the first time.
This is Chloe’s destiny now, her one shot at glory, and she has a reason to focus, punishing herself with a gruelling schedule. Burying her hurt beneath fresh bruises.
It’s tempting to call the play a one-hander but that would be to the detriment of the combinations that Jodie Campbell expertly delivers throughout this very physical production.
A performance with bite
She works hard – jab, jab, cross, hook. She keeps her head defended and her emotional carapace intact, but the glimpses we do get – at home with tender girlfriend Jamie for example – reveal a sweet young woman, brittle but not broken, grieving but not knowing it yet.
Campbell’s performance is full of charm and swagger even when she’s coming closest to meeting the demands of the play’s overwrought title. Bitchy, maybe, but never a bitch.
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So when she’s in the ring, fighting for the championship – energised by Jessie Addinall’s inventive lighting design – we’re rooting for her, not just in this particular contest but in life, which is tougher.
Charlie Josephine’s streetwise script fails to ask the hard questions and there’s an inevitable over-reliance on boxing analogies. But to give that tendency one more round, this little production still packs a gutsy punch.
Bitch Boxer plays at the Arcola Theatre until 14 March 2025.
This review first appeared on The Spy In The Stalls.