We are all cliches (Chatroom/Citizenship - National Theatre)

On a whim I had took myself off to the National's revival of Chatroom and Citizenship, two of the plays from 2006's connections series, this evening.

They are aimed at teenagers (both to perform and to watch) so maybe I shouldn't be too critical. But I found them at heart rather light morality plays, eerily reminiscent (if much better acted) of the skits we were made to act out for assembly back in my school days.

In neither play did I really think I was actually listening to real teenagers, in Chatroom for a bunch of depressed adolescents they were remarkable loquacious, in Citizenship several characters felt like parodies that Sacha Baron Cohen would be proud of. The charecters were merely ways of addressing the issues, bullying and depression for Chatroom, and teenage sexuality for Citizenship .

But they are both laugh out loud funny, both plays passing the Kermode test (a comedy must make you laugh out loud 5 times to qualify as such) with ease, and kept the group of teenagers I was sat next too engaged throughout. So all in all not bad.