Playwright Lewis Teckkam has cerebral palsy, and – as he tells us – “needs other people’s help to do everything except think”. In this intriguing and inventive show, Teckkam gives voice to those thoughts through a three-man chorus, who cluster round his wheelchair in the centre of the stage. He roots the script in his specific circumstances but gives it wider resonance too, reflecting the doubts and contradictions we all have in our heads and revealing the inner dialogue that drives us.

Each of the three voices has a distinctive and well-drawn personality. The gentle and mannered Memory looks poignantly deflated when faced with things he can’t understand, while Imagination is silkily agile and eternally curious, staring into space at a vision only he has seen. And then there’s the mercurial Intrusive Thoughts, more puckish than evil, who often hovers closest to Teckkam’s ear to whisper both harmful self-doubt and energising iconoclasm.

The motif works best when the characters’ dialogue also reflects their distinctive roles. In one particularly effective passage, Teckkam holds a political debate inside his own head, with the voices representing the hopeful, radical, and pragmatic wings of his party. The script’s themes are unashamedly wide-ranging, though broadly focussed on Teckkam’s lived experience and perspective on the world; the energy of the interplay between Teckkam and his inner voices gives theatrical force to commentary that might otherwise feel annoyingly on-the-nose.

A little too often though, Memory and Imagination become a simple pair of narrators, relaying Teckkam’s conclusions more than the process that’s got him there. And while the script’s not without structure – there’s a clever parallel between his lack of control over his own environment and the helplessness he feels in the face of world events – it darts around from concept to concept, and over-elaborates its messages at times. The originality of the format and the candour of Teckkam’s perspective give the play real weight, but a tighter through-line would make for an even more satisfying whole.

Also hugely satisfying is the musical accompaniment from Cormac Thomas, performed live from the side of the stage. With instruments ranging from keyboard to chimes to a singing bowl, Thomas builds a liminal, almost meditative soundscape that perfectly draws us into the currents of a human mind. Music, script and acting combine in a powerful act of communication, cleverly turning the practical reality of performance into a compelling expressive form.