Punch – Young Masculinity and Restorative Justice
Based on the memoir Right From Wrong by Jacob Dunne, Punch is the latest production by James Graham (of Dear England fame) to hit the stage, playing at the Young Vic. The play tells the book’s story; of how its writer inadvertently kills a trainee paramedic, James Hodgkinson, with a single punch on a night out in Nottingham. It is as uncompromising a work as it sounds, and one which left good amounts of the audience in tears, shock, or a combination of the two.
I promise to review it with as few puns as possible.
Punch opened in medias res, the res being a good old-fashioned night out: Jacob’s monologue sets out the pattern of dressing up, pub-crawling, substances, and the young male’s insatiable urge for action, drama, violence. For the first minute or so, I was a little concerned that this would all land a little on the nose. Several instances in which the cast do their best impression of a Year 8 drama class acting out the sniffing of a bag furthered my concern. As the play goes on, however, the narrative fractures into nonlinearity; very much in vogue, and often misused but here working a treat: it allows Jacob to embody simultaneously the naive adolescent and the guilty repentant; the manly boy and the wiser man.
In flitting between the two, actor David Shields’ body work was impressive; one moment charged with macho energy, and the next avoidant of eye-contact, fearful and small. An on-stage wardrobe change confirmed what I hadn’t quite imagined fully: Jacob is absolutely jacked, as in whatever comes after 12-pack jacked. And so much of the lessons he learns through the play are about channelling his power, rather than denying its existence. It’s a message many men, drawn to the flame of Tate-style masculinism, should urgently hear: their manliness is not the problem. Their misuse of it to harm others is. Through its poking dance around the dark centre of violence, Punch manages to be thoroughly un-woke in presenting the pitfalls (and the path out) for modern young men.
The performances of the six-person cast altogether were strong; all tasked with fulfilling roles both within Jacob’s troublemaking set and outside of it, casting their concern from afar. Special mention must go to Julie Hesmondhalgh and Tony Hirst, who play the separated parents of the victim with spectacular humanity, propping each other up as events hurl them into an undesired closeness again. Shalisha James-Davis did brilliantly to remain more than just a mouthpiece for the play’s important and overt messages of restorative justice, and Emma Pallant’s jaded but tireless parole officer was as much of a mother to Jacob as he could wish for following the loss of his own.
The general feeling (judging on sniffles alone) was that Punch’s strong opening half was comfortably topped by a gut-wrenching second. Suspense, which has been building from the first air-punch, the first line and the first mention of the terrible deed, arrives at an emotional zenith as Jacob finally meets with the parents of his victim. Their stoic suppression of rage and their strains towards compassion are the perfect complement to Jacob’s humble, powerless acceptance of his guilt. I was unalone in sobbing through this special scene.
The main issues I had with Punch centred around Jacob’s release from prison, when he is immediately buttered up by his old gang. This is believable, as is his shame and inability to visit his mother again. In these conditions, what is it really that rescues him from repeating patterns? Is it really solely his experience of restorative justice, as poignant as it is? It’s likely the book explains more, but on stage Jacob’s redemptive arc comes, if not out of the blue, then with a certain flavour of deus ex materna. Upon his return to see his mum, the weakest scene of the play unfolded in a slew of ‘naturalistic’ dialogue, where sentences go unfini-, words hang unspoken like a stench on the air. Happily this scene stood out as an odd anomaly, and for the most part, Punch’s lines effectively conjure up a familiar world of shady estates and beery boozers.
Encroaching on these cul-de-sacs, however, is the slightly hesitant discourse of restorative justice. I think the play did a wonderful job of highlighting how experimental these practices feel, and how they don’t hold any inherent good, just inherent humanity. In the awkward pauses, the reaches for biscuits and tissues, Punch points towards a truly different way of dealing with injustice. It doesn’t pretend this is a painless process, because it isn’t. In the throes of our current political crises, epidemics of male violence and broken penal system, restorative justice is worthwhile all the same.
Punch is dedicated to James Hodgkinson and all victims of one-punch violence.
Will Staveley © 2025.
Punch – Young Masculinity and Restorative Justice
Based on the memoir Right From Wrong by Jacob Dunne, Punch is the latest production by James Graham (of Dear England fame) to hit the stage, playing at the Young Vic. The play tells the book’s story; of how its writer inadvertently kills a trainee paramedic, James Hodgkinson, with a single punch on a night out in Nottingham. It is as uncompromising a work as it sounds, and one which left good amounts of the audience in tears, shock, or a combination of the two.
I promise to review it with as few puns as possible.
Punch opened in medias res, the res being a good old-fashioned night out: Jacob’s monologue sets out the pattern of dressing up, pub-crawling, substances, and the young male’s insatiable urge for action, drama, violence. For the first minute or so, I was a little concerned that this would all land a little on the nose. Several instances in which the cast do their best impression of a Year 8 drama class acting out the sniffing of a bag furthered my concern. As the play goes on, however, the narrative fractures into nonlinearity; very much in vogue, and often misused but here working a treat: it allows Jacob to embody simultaneously the naive adolescent and the guilty repentant; the manly boy and the wiser man.
In flitting between the two, actor David Shields’ body work was impressive; one moment charged with macho energy, and the next avoidant of eye-contact, fearful and small. An on-stage wardrobe change confirmed what I hadn’t quite imagined fully: Jacob is absolutely jacked, as in whatever comes after 12-pack jacked. And so much of the lessons he learns through the play are about channelling his power, rather than denying its existence. It’s a message many men, drawn to the flame of Tate-style masculinism, should urgently hear: their manliness is not the problem. Their misuse of it to harm others is. Through its poking dance around the dark centre of violence, Punch manages to be thoroughly un-woke in presenting the pitfalls (and the path out) for modern young men.
The performances of the six-person cast altogether were strong; all tasked with fulfilling roles both within Jacob’s troublemaking set and outside of it, casting their concern from afar. Special mention must go to Julie Hesmondhalgh and Tony Hirst, who play the separated parents of the victim with spectacular humanity, propping each other up as events hurl them into an undesired closeness again. Shalisha James-Davis did brilliantly to remain more than just a mouthpiece for the play’s important and overt messages of restorative justice, and Emma Pallant’s jaded but tireless parole officer was as much of a mother to Jacob as he could wish for following the loss of his own.
The general feeling (judging on sniffles alone) was that Punch’s strong opening half was comfortably topped by a gut-wrenching second. Suspense, which has been building from the first air-punch, the first line and the first mention of the terrible deed, arrives at an emotional zenith as Jacob finally meets with the parents of his victim. Their stoic suppression of rage and their strains towards compassion are the perfect complement to Jacob’s humble, powerless acceptance of his guilt. I was unalone in sobbing through this special scene.
The main issues I had with Punch centred around Jacob’s release from prison, when he is immediately buttered up by his old gang. This is believable, as is his shame and inability to visit his mother again. In these conditions, what is it really that rescues him from repeating patterns? Is it really solely his experience of restorative justice, as poignant as it is? It’s likely the book explains more, but on stage Jacob’s redemptive arc comes, if not out of the blue, then with a certain flavour of deus ex materna. Upon his return to see his mum, the weakest scene of the play unfolded in a slew of ‘naturalistic’ dialogue, where sentences go unfini-, words hang unspoken like a stench on the air. Happily this scene stood out as an odd anomaly, and for the most part, Punch’s lines effectively conjure up a familiar world of shady estates and beery boozers.
Encroaching on these cul-de-sacs, however, is the slightly hesitant discourse of restorative justice. I think the play did a wonderful job of highlighting how experimental these practices feel, and how they don’t hold any inherent good, just inherent humanity. In the awkward pauses, the reaches for biscuits and tissues, Punch points towards a truly different way of dealing with injustice. It doesn’t pretend this is a painless process, because it isn’t. In the throes of our current political crises, epidemics of male violence and broken penal system, restorative justice is worthwhile all the same.
Punch is dedicated to James Hodgkinson and all victims of one-punch violence.
Will Staveley © 2025.
By Will Staveley • plays, theatre, year 2025 • Tags: plays, theatre, Will Staveley