Prophets

Kerris, a paleoclimatologist, arrives on a small, scantly populated island in the South Pacific to study ancient remnants of the world’s changing weather. Her attempts to discover more about the island’s colonial past are mysteriously thwarted. And she soon discovers that the ancient air bubbles trapped in the local coral aren’t the only things caught fast in the island’s thrall.

Prophets is a blustery tempest of a play, spliced together as carefully as the boats built by local Jack of all trades, Joe. The thrill of Jack MacGregor‘s script lies in the casual normality of Kerris’ arrival on the island with the initially low key weirdness unfurling like a ship’s sail.

Actors Rebecca Wilkie and Xander Cowan do magnificent justice to Macgregor’s words. Wilkie is initially clinical, careful, confused by the ways she seems to be blocked at every turn so her final revelation is all the more startling. Cowan’s Joe is as cautious as a seabird, he is versatile and consistently creepy as the various peculiar island occupants and as Kerris’ patient boyfriend, he wears his sadness like a badge. It would be easy to make this production all Royston Vasey but all tribute to director Fraser Scott, the tightly wound end result is anything but.

Emma Moran‘s set is simultaneously Fringe-friendly and perfectly creepy – a masterclass is doing more with less. Lights (versatile tiny torches) and lighting are used to brilliant effect – the final showdown would be right at home in a horror film. Sound – supported at this performance with thunderous rain on the RoxyBoxy roof – layers on the suspense building to the cathartic denouement.

If trigger warnings are helpful to you, look them up as revealing them would wreck the awful twofold surprise of the show. Macgregor’s show explores the impact of trauma, told through the lens of a contemporary cult. In a world in which few things seem to make sense any more, this is a timely and interesting production. Returns only for the rest of the run.