If you’re a renter, a recent homebuyer or an aspiring one, you probably have first-hand experience with the housing crisis.
According to a report by Axios last year, America is short roughly 3.2 million homes. Locally, rent prices have risen dramatically since the pandemic. This has caused Richmond to have one of the highest eviction rates in the country, leading City Council to declare a local housing crisis last April.
Diving headlong into the fray is Philip Ridley’s black comedy “Radiant Vermin.” Staged locally by 5th Wall Theatre, the play concerns Jill and Ollie, a young couple who have been chosen by the government to take part in a program that will give them the house of their dreams. Without giving too much away, there’s a catch, and it’s a rather violent one.
Morrie Piersol, the show’s director, says “Radiant Vermin” is unlike any play he’s encountered before, calling it a “quirky, creative, contemporary piece.”
“It’s not realistic,” he says. “The premise of it is a couple who are telling us, the audience, the story of what happened to them as it relates to their avarice.”
Kaitlin Paige Longoria, 5th Wall’s creative producer, brought the show to Piersol and 5th Wall’s board, saying she couldn’t put down the script when she first read it.
“I was crying. I saw myself and every person my age in this play,” says Longoria, who plays Jill in the show. “We, as millennials in 2024, are experiencing this struggle to afford housing. Everybody wants to get a house right now.”
Matt Mitchell, who plays Ollie in the show, echoes Longoria about the current housing crisis.
“This holds huge weight for people of my generation that feel shut out of the housing market,” says Mitchell, who is also Longoria’s partner in real life. “A certain desperation has set in amongst people of our age when we’ve come to the realization that we might never be able to do this.”
Mitchell says “Radiant Vermin” reminds him of the frequently violent and funny work of Martin McDonagh, a British-Irish playwright, director and screenwriter.
“I compare it to a dream — if you fell asleep tossing and turning with anxiety about the housing market,” Mitchell says. “It lives in this space where, depending on the audience, it’s a comedy or it might be drama, because it lives in this gray area of tension where some people are going to burst out laughing, people are going to listen in shocked silence at it.”
Longoria says the play intensifies through the telling.
“The stakes get higher and higher,” she explains. “Once you have a taste of the good life, it’s hard to go back to not getting everything you want and not having the best things. [Ollie and Jill] start to morph as people, and the audience is part of that journey as well.”
Part of the show’s challenge is depicting multiple characters with just three actors.
“It’s a lot of physicality,” Longoria says. “It’s a lot of Matt and myself acting these things out with just ourselves. There’s points when Matt is onstage by himself depicting a violent interaction with another person, but it’s just him.”
Longoria says the play’s Faustian exploration of how far we’re willing to go to get what we want is a fascinating one.
“If you are looking for a play that is engaging, challenging, where you want to experience full belly laughs and tearful moments of compassion, you should see this play,” she says. “Every millennial who has ever bought a house or has tried to buy a house should come see this play. If you just want to go on a wild ride for two acts, then this is where you need to be.”
5th Wall Theatre’s “Radiant Vermin” runs March 14-30 at The Basement, 300 E. Broad St., 23219. For more information, visit 5thwalltheatre.org.
