Burst

Simultaneously telling two separate stories set in Roaring Twenties London and post-colonial Sudan, Burst aims to show how cultures and families "consume themselves" in endless cycles.

Given this dual narrative, the show makes excellent use of what might have been an awkward space, managing two different stories and timeframes fluidly. One misstep is having off-stage characters stand facing the wall, making them look like they’re lined up at a urinal.

The cast turn in assured, sometimes charming performances. In particular, they generate a great deal of awkward humour from sex, making the most of a script that has real human energy when it’s not being portentous. However, having the same actors perform different roles seems to lay bare inadequacies in the accents – the Sudanese accents differ only slightly from the London mode in which they are much more comfortable.

Indeed, the London strand weighs the play down. Its sub-Waugh characters are too overdone, and the themes of simultaneity and circularity are expressed though small gestures: murmured songs, the shouting of a newspaper seller, even the looping of a sound effect. In contrast, the main narratives descend into cliché and hysteria. Once you get to the free-spirit storyteller daughter forced into an arranged marriage, or the handsome foreigner broken by the hypocrisy of liberal bohemia, it’s difficult to stay engaged.

The production achieves the difficult task of creating two interconnected worlds within one cramped space. Unfortunately, in its efforts to support both of these worlds, the script seems to burst at the seams.