Showing @ Assembly Rooms, Edinburgh until Sun 24 Aug (not 18) @ 14:05 (then on tour)
Two of Scotland’s top theatre companies, Stellar Quines and Lung Ha’s, have collaborated with the Finnish National Theatre in this remarkable play about inter-generational conflict written by Paula Salminen. While the daughter, Eva (a funny and touching performance from Nicola Tuxworth), is hellbent on leaving home or ‘this godforsaken backwater’ as she calls it, her mother (the riveting Louise Ludgate) has walked out. Meantime dementia-prone gran (the always watchable Anne Lacey) has metaphorically left the building – sometimes lucid, sometimes off the map.
Each one hopes that leaving or staying put will help fix her messy life. At its heart, this compassionate play portrays the struggle to find freedom and happiness, and the courage to face whatever fate throws at you. However sometimes the story’s time shifts – it takes place over three decades – are a little confusing. If all this sounds too bleak to bear – it’s not. It’s a funny, multilayered and engrossing play. Each character is well drawn and an imaginative set (from Jan Bee Brown), atmospheric lighting (Simon Wilkinson) and music (Susan Appelbe) complement nimble direction from Maria Oller.