Showing @ Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh until Sat 9 Jun

Wednesday’s launch of yet another series of the now trite and mundane Big Brother franchise shows how the allure of fame and the “status” it brings is still one much clamoured for. Blue Raincoat’s production of Eugène Ionesco’s The Chairs is a sharply perceptive and satirical take on the overvaluing of society’s eminent figures, while also a darkly comic imagining of the consequences of this conviction.

An antiquated married couple (John Carty and Sandra O’Malley) are settling in for the night when the husband announces he’s hired an orator to give a speech on his behalf to everyone who’s anyone. And he’s invited them all to their island home for a press conference that evening. As the night shuffles along, guests continue to appear, culminating in a climactic verbal dénouement.

Despite Niall Henry’s minimalist style, there are a number of pleasing directorial decisions: the robotic movements of the husband and wife, the sparse, shell-like set (obviously a metaphor for their own isolated lives). Yet at the same time, the direction can seem hushed in the presence of the twosome’s gripping performances as well as eclipsed by Ionesco’s incredibly potent script. Here, we are reminded of the playwright’s soaring artistic intelligence which stemmed from his love of absurdist theatre, as he wove commentaries on both quirky and political aspects of society from the eccentricity of language to anti-establishment.

Ionesco is a master of images; in Rhinoceros, an almost ludicrous snapshot of a stage full of rhinos commented quite fiercely on humanity’s conformity to cultural ideologies. The rows of empty seats in The Chairs, occupied by fictitious guests, represent the influence that anonymous figures can have on our lives, signalling Ionesco’s vigorous statement on how the importance of many celebrated people is actually far more trivial than purported. These themes remain profound today in times of trend-setting social media, but perhaps more satisfying is the idea that Ionesco is warning us against false prophets – especially those who appear on Channel 5.