This slow-burning and poignant new drama by the artists formerly known as Top of the World (responsible for 2008’s Fringe First Award-winningPaperweight) shows the company confidently deepening their unique focus on the challenges of what it is to be human, and particularly male, in the modern world. The production is grounded in powerfully nuanced performances from Sebastien Lawson and Tom Frankland, two thirty-something guys who have escaped (on a surf board) tidal waves battering the UK and are now attempting to pass the time before their food runs out in Ali (Lawson)’s bachelor flat. If this sounds serious that’s because it’s one of the only shows I’ve seen at this year’s Fringe genuinely attempting to process through performance real and complex issues that connect our psychological and political selves. This is thoughtful, challenging drama, but it’s also constantly surprising, emotionally rich and, unusually for devised work, moves delicately through a twisty and convincing narrative. And it’s punctuated by some great gags.
The story’s weird twists and turns are strongly complemented by Cis O’Boyle’s unsettling and lurid light design, pushing the strangeness of this very recognisable world. As the story progresses we move increasingly away from the realism suggested by James Lewis’ imposing set and the comforting backdrop of Radio 4 (even if it is reporting on the apocalypse) and deeper into richly ambiguous psychological territories encompassing identity, aggression, fear and hope. The production’s opening sequence is a sweet animation (by Magali Charrier) projected onto the set introducing each character. They begin naked and we watch them cycle through different everyday clothes, pastimes, and finally inner anxieties and constrictions. By the end, the projection returns, now amplified to fill a whole back-wall screen (cleverly completed by the insertion of Ali’s surf board), its perspective spinning out and out until we are observing the tiny acts of fear, frustration and desperation played out on a global canvas. And, impressively, the company earn this shift in scale, these two contemporary every-men, both believing in better, both on the run, bringing to life a state of being that resonates and challenges us.
Playful, searingly honest and making a serious attempt to address profound and complex ideas, this was my pick of the Fringe this year. Powerful, provocative stuff, beautifully played.