After the runaway success of his company's On The Verge Of Exploding at last year's Fringe, John Wright directs a group of graduate students from Middlesex University in another affecting piece of tragic clowning. It's a tale of two innocents, an amiable man and his exuberant daughter, who try to maintain a normal life in a war zone – symbolised, bizarrely, by a set made out of 5000 shoes. Refugees invade their home and steal their food; fighters not much older than children slaughter one another and bicker, while the characters perform poignant parodies of everyday suburban rituals. Jason Thorpe and Emma Powell are entrancing in the central roles.
Written for The Independent.
Copyright © Ian Shuttleworth; all rights reserved.
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