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Driftwood

Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh

Four stars

 

Storm clouds are gathering in Tim Foley’s new play, set on a beach in North East England that becomes both sanctuary and battleground for the two brothers who reunite to bury their father. Mark is the reluctant prodigal, the one who got away to find success, freedom and a life a million miles away from the now dead end town he couldn’t waiter get away from. Tiny is the one who stayed behind to look after his old man, hanging on his stories, with the big bad world a restless ocean away. For now, at least, the tide has gone out enough to leave them space to try and soothe troubled waters. 

 

Foley’s two-hander is brought to full roaring theatrical life in this touring co-production between the Wigan based ThickSkin and Shropshire sired Pentabus companies. Directors Neil Bettles and Elle While pull out all the stylistic stops to make it work, with he first thing that greets the audience the rolling waves of Sarah Readman’s video backdrop pulsed by Lee Affen’s seismic sound design.

 

James Westphal as Mark and Jerome Yates as Tiny circle around each other on Lulu Tam’s set, updated by Bettles and Tom Robbins since the production was first seen in 2023. It is the interplay between Westphal and Yates that captures the heart of Foley’s script. As Mark and Tiny spar, they find some kind of common ground through shared experience beyond the very different paths each has taken, though not before they cast out old demons that come in the form of the mythical Mariner of Tiny’s fevered imagination.

 

Set against a backdrop of Brexit, freeports and the managed decline of northern Britain dressed up as regeneration, the uneasy truce that emerges from the brothers’ collective purging evolves into a startling fusion of text, physical theatre and Readman’s increasingly abstract imagery. This makes for a moving and captivating play a play that tackles everyday matters of life and death in thrilling fashion.


The Herald, March 7th 2025

 

ends

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