Pleasance Dome

August 27th

Script:  Stagecraft:  Performance:    

Whew! Men seem to be getting a bad rep at this year’s Fringe! I left this show with the chills and feeling just a bit shaken at what I’d just watched. Was this a spot of the “Me Too” movement taking place in the Pleasance Dome? How Stuart Law’s rom-com set in deep space, managed to take it’s audience from the plot-thin standard fare of fringe comedy to a stunned silence at it’s denouement was very clever indeed.

Will Brown and Phoebe Sparrow play Adam and Kate, who find themselves in the hothouse of a new relationship, made even hotter by the fact that they are together twenty-four-seven on a spaceship headed into the depths of space. Comedic charm soon turns toxic and we watch the couple lose their lustre for each other. In orbit around this story arc there’s a lot of back history about Adam’s previous partner, also Kate’s sister, who seems to have gone a bit off the rails. Poor Adam makes a lot of appeals to the audience for understanding as this new relationship rapidly seems to be spiralling into a similar chaos. The pressure builds to an explosive and pretty unexpected climax. Without giving too much away, expect to have your allegiances shattered.

There are some laughs along the journey. Zero-gravity and men’s untidiness don’t seem to mix well in a cramped shared cabin. The comedy, well-populated at first, does become more remote as the characters begin to drop their pretences. There’s much more to this play, however, than Red-Dwarf meets Love Island, it just all seems to come on one all of a sudden. The whole gravity of the situation comes down on the two characters and like Scotty in Star Trek would say “She just cannae take any more captain! If I give her any more she’s gonna blow!” Fireworks ensue….

Mark Mackenzie