The Ukraine has, long before the England football team's fantastic visions of the semi-finals, been the subject of another sort of vision. A utopian vision which saw the territory being populated by thousands of sturdy peasants who would occupy and cultivate the soil; construct bustling highways studded with prosperous towns. The visionary noted that all this 'in a hundred years' will be 'one of the loveliest gardens in the world'. It's a pleasant vision this, although one thought up by the man who has forever tainted the idea of utopian visions in our mind - Adolf Hitler.
It's so much easier to be a pessimist. If it hasn't been said yet, doom-loving types, like Scottish Presbyterians, have never had it so good. Democracy is in crisis, the international financial system is (still) tottering over the abyss and, according to a recent article in The Sun, the voluptuous Kim Kardashian is representative of a wider social and moral malaise which the West is suffering from. So to 'Utopia' then, showing at the Soho Theatre, and hopefully some optimism to buck the general trend. 'Utopia?' I ask. 'Second floor on the right' I'm told by the staff. Now that's service.
The play attempts to buck this general sense of impending catastrophe with a collection of misty eyed views of happier worlds. It's put together by various writers, and has several stories running in parallel throughout. We dip in and out of these, never quite settling on one before being whisked off to another. 'Utopia' is also peppered with musical numbers which (alarmingly) seem to stick with you several days after the performance.
There are some flashes of insight and humour here, and the writing shouldn't be criticised for a lack of structure. Indeed the amorphous feel to the production lends itself to a constant reassessment and reconsideration of the themes. We travel from a family dinner party gone wrong to a piece of science fiction; from an old folk's home to a dystopian future when the disease of ageing has been overcome. The result is an odyssey through a collection of scenes. Some of these are better than others: some of the stories are glib and throw-away; others thought provoking and engaging.
Nevertheless the overwhelming impression is light-hearted. This is definitely a 'post-Hitler' piece of utopian writing, after all. Best not to take utopian thoughts too seriously. One scene involving child soldiers, for example, stood out for its intensity. Yet it was quickly resolved into a satirical farce involving a warlord thanking Facebook and despairing at the billion people online calling for his arrest.
Yet, while understandable, this smirking and knowing tone fits uneasily with the general premise of a utopia. It's an ironic, sarcastic and grounded tone running through the play; it apparently challenges the very idea of searching for utopia at all. Utopia should require an imaginative leap of faith, after all - it should be more than a simple exercise in seducing a slightly moody and austere Britain into a smile. Utopias are not light-hearted ideas: at their best they act as sharp critiques of an age, and are daring and imaginative; at their worst it's more than just ink that is spilled over their formulation.
'Utopia' unfortunately shies away from these more grandiose ideas and opts for the simpler path of sketches and humour. It is, to take one of the highlights from the play, like one of those twee middle class dinner parties. The host, worried that he might offend or bore his guests with a big issue which could descend into an intellectual joust, steers into the safer waters of wit and anecdote. A few handy quotations are thrown in for good measure and everyone goes home happy. It's entertaining, but hardly groundbreaking.
Utopia is showing at the Soho Theatre
Wed 20 Jun - Sat 14 Jul, 7.30pm (Thu/Sat Matinees 3pm)
21 - 30 June £15 (£12.50); 2 - 14 July £20 (£17.50)