Andrew Clover: Love Rules

As a self-professed 'WAD' (writer, actor, dad), Andrew Clover is here to impart some wisdom on the great art of love and how to keep it alive. A one-time Perrier nominee and columnist for The Sunday Times, Clover cuts a dapper, if slightly dishevelled figure. He’s quirky and charming but Love Rules is a show that really doesn’t gel.

It doesn’t help that the audience seems remarkably unimaginative, responding to each hopeful question with an embarrassed giggling that Clover is unable to turn into anything fruitful. He’s often left on stage floundering and the stopping and starting stifles any true rhythm from establishing itself within this set.

Setting himself up as a ‘love guru’, Clover imparts the lessons on love that he has learned the hard way with his wife. He ridicules the sanctimonious voices in such books as Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus but his own thoughts are equally as hackneyed. They are delivered in an occasionally sweet but more often slightly uncomfortably wacky format. Apparently, Clover tells us, the real truth is that women are wasps, and men snails.

There are some nice moments of structured storytelling in a spotlight and clever callbacks that point to his undoubtable skill as a writer. But even though these observations will raise wry smiles from smug married couples, there is nothing new on offer here. Clover’s columns are probably worth a read, but he needs to come up with something more cohesive for the stage.