In one of the most moving scenes that I’ve ever witnessed in a theater,  Jacob finally meets the parents of the young man whom he killed. Making an extraordinary Broadway debut, Will Harrison as Jacob stares at the floor, chokes on his breath, struggles to speak: “I didn’t want to say ‘sorry’,” he manages to get out, ”because it feels too small.  I instead wanted to do something. But I am sorry…”

The memorable encounter between Jacob and the parents,  Joan (Victoria Clark) and David (Sam Robards)  comes in the final half hour of “Punch,” a play by James Graham based on Jacob Dunne’s 2022 memoir “Right from Wrong,” and it turns the true story into compelling drama. I wish I could feel as strongly about the two hours leading up to that moment. 

“Punch” begins with Jacob explaining how, as a 19-year-old lad from the Meadows Housing Estate, a rough-and-tumble public housing project in Nottingham, he had fallen into getting high, dealing drugs, and hanging out with the other members of his neighborhood gang. Their chief activity was waiting for the next “drama,” which is what they called the casual violence that they lived for.  Although Jacob is apparently recounting his exploits as part of a support group, it’s with a swagger and hyped-up delight that reminded me of the beginning of “A Clockwork Orange.”  Jacob admits: “Doing bad things creates good feelings. It just does.”

The punch, which we don’t see directly, came about over a petty argument in a pub over a hat. Jacob came to the rescue of his mates (as he saw it) by slugging James Hodgkinson, whom he had never met before. It was just a single punch, but it knocked James to the pavement head first. Nine days later in the hospital, his parents took him off life support. Jacob served 14 months for manslaughter. 

All this is necessary to tell, of course,  as are some of the details of Jacob’s family life and his upbringing. But there is more here about the people and problems of Nottingham than I felt I needed to know. Yes, it’s the same Nottingham that’s famous to tourists as the home of the legendary outlaw Robin Hood, but this is not mentioned, because this is not Nottingham for tourists. The play often seems geared for an audience from Nottingham, and, as it turns out, Graham (whose previous Broadway credits include “Ink” and the book for “Tammy Faye”) grew up near Nottingham, and “Punch” was originally produced at Nottingham Playhouse, whose artistic director, Adam Penford, is directing the Broadway production.

Penford invests many of the scenes with a stylized theatricality that looked to have emerged from a series of theater games, with the ensemble in such constant motion it was as if the director was afraid the audience would otherwise lose interest in the story.

The theatricality couldn’t mask the fact that the waywardness of youth has been depicted many times before; and there is not much new even in the astute social commentary about the have-nots of Nottingham that Graham threads throughout. What’s fresh and riveting here is what happens to Jacob after he gets out of prison – in particular, the unlikely, wary relationship that develops between him and James’s parents. Their connection is initiated and then encouraged both by Jacob’s probation officer Wendy (Lucy Taylor, who also portrays Jacob’s Mum),  and by Nicola (Camila Canó-Flaviá, who also portrays Jacob’s girlfriend.) Nicola works for an agency that promotes restorative justice.  This difficult abstract-sounding concept changed the lives of all three people; the parents’ willingness to reach out to Jacob, he tells them in his halting way, “probably saved my life.”

Since “Punch” is based on Jacob’s memoir and thus his perspective, it is somewhat hamstrung from giving equal weight to all three characters. I would have preferred a more streamlined play with a greater focus on the three of them.  But at one point, Joan explains that they took James off life support because three of the five vital organs required for human life had shut down. Later, Jacob asks what are the five vital organs. And Joan points to each part of her body (with Jacob copying her) as she explains: “a working brain that thinks our thought. Liver that protects us from poisons, bad things. A kidney to clean us up.  Lungs, to help us breathe. And a heart that beats.”

If the play isn’t perfect, there is enough in “Punch” to make it feel vital.

Punch
Samuel J. Friedman Theatre through November 2
Running time: Two hours and thirty minutes, with a fifteen-minute intermission.
Tickets: $90 – $291
Written by James Graham 
Directed by Adam Penford
Scenic and costume design by Anna Fleischle, lighting design by Robbie Butler, original music and sign design by Alexandra Faye Braithwaite, movement director Leanne Pinder, dialect coach, Ben Furey and Charlotte Fleck 
Cast: Camila Canó-Flaviá as Clare/Nicola, Victoria Clark as Joan/Nan, Will Harrison as Jacob, Cody Kostro as Raf/Sam, Piter Marek as Tony/Derek/DS Villers, Sam Robards as David/Raf’s Dad, and Lucy Taylor as Mum/Wendy.
Photographs by Matthew Murphy