London, 1995. Rosie Delaware, estate agent, is pushing through the sale of a self-conscious riverside penthouse (with walls done by the 'Darcey Bussell of rag-rolling') to one P.G. Wodehouse. But his is a pseudonym, and he is a powerful 'businessman' from Eastern Europe who insists on paying for the property with a suitcase of cash. So, 'A Buyer's Market' unfolds, and we are exposed to the grimacing world of the Russian Mafia where a Rodean education, nuclear missiles and a British Passport can be bought and sold with hard currency and a Kalashnikov. 
     This, though, is not a tale of the innocents versus the criminal nasties: the seller of the apartment, Axel Vincent, is a foppish braggart and writer of airport novels who is only too happy to form a schoolboy bond with the tough Wodehouse. By contrast, 'Ernest Hemingway', Wodehouse's hapless lackey, is caught in the trap of crime, wanting only to go back to his country and fight for his people. 
     If this sounds like a cliché, it is deliberate, as the whole play teeters between the very real and terrifying world of organised crime and the cod accents and crocodile tears of Heathrow's bookshop. Because of this, any serious points about market forces or the West's handling of Eastern Europe are lost. What we are left with, though, is sharp, clever and funny dialogue, and if not an exploration into the political climate that enables the Russian Mafia to exist, at least we recognise that 'life is not only cheap in novels.' 
     The actors assimilate the cringe-worthy lines with great skill and finesse, so that the audience laughs rather than groans. Emma Cuniffe as Rosie reveals her character's motivation, vulnerability and ultimate strength with poise and subtlety. Matthew Marsh's 'P.G Wodehouse' swaggers all over the stage, an imposing physical presence who is always ready with a lie and a smile. Anthony Calf is hilarious as the wet-behind-the-ears Axel Vincent and Jalaal Hartley's 'Ernest Hemingway' switches seamlessly between daytime soap baddie to a man consumed with pain at the raping of his country. 
     Indeed, it is the dualities of melodrama and reality; fact and fiction; right and wrong that drive 'A Buyer's Market.' Bicat succeeds in occupying the shades of grey in- between by reflecting our often ill informed and hackneyed views about gangsters, Russians and estate agents. However, as the title as one of Vincent's novels suggests, he leaves us with 'No Answers.'
Loma-Ann Bonner