Edinburgh Fringe
theSpace Triplex, Jenner Theatre
12^th – 21^st Aug, 2021

The Space Triplex down a side street was revealed to be a large room with a few rows of chairs and a stage that took up half the room. My focus was brought to a yellow table cloth. There was a bed, two tables and a woman sat at the yellow one writing something. This was a play called Plasters which involved two Andrea and Chris as a couple who like to thrash things out. All starting jovially and in good spirits, though there was something not quite right.

It was a snap shot of human life, the kind of situation so many can relate to. I’ve heard the story before; we can hear it all the time as we float by phone conversations on the streets. But they seemed for a short while to be well and in love sharing humour about things.

In the play Andreas costume was her bedroom pyjamas from the beginning was this some kind of signal for help. The large space helped the play grow in our minds increasing our levels of pleasure as the audience. And its intentions were only revealed as and when. It was a very giving performance with the active and upbeat Chris cajoling her, where at first she would smile and wave it off.

It wasn’t just a normal day and we soon realised that she was in fact suffering him and unsure of a great many things. We still took well to the performance even through her raging dialogue, her upset heart, but Chris stayed around trying to capture her and holding her in his arms, she smiled lovingly then spat out that love to his confusion and his indignation.

Chris’s manly movements offered the opposite to Andrea’s shy and almost regretful demeanour, their youth was touching as was so much of this performance. There was an ease of flow through a conversation that was to be confounded by Andrea’s vocalisations of her hearts rending pain. And he went right there with her.

She seemed unreasonable and self justifying, to which he too flew off the handle though never aggressively. But she quietened and they sat on the bed holding each other and joking again. But to finally lead us into the expertly placed plot her mind left the room again and it seemed to go dark. She recalled a memory of certain things describing them but became troubled and couldn’t quite tell what was really going on.

They put the joys and sorrows of a life time into just under an hour of theatre. And once revealed the points unmissable stakes were high but everything was disturbed. We knew not the events that caused her fragility but even as the stage fell quite we didn’t know but it was enough not to know. Like a radar the importance of the play was there for all to see and to relate to.

Daniel Donnelly