Where the White Stops

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In Antler Theatre’s enchanting new show, headstrong protagonist Crab has itchy feet. Crab lives in a village beneath the protective branches of a huge tree, shielded from the dangers outside. But like all good adventurers, Crab wants to find out what is beyond the world she knows, deciding on a whim to step outside her village and seek out the end of the expansive white that surrounds it.

The tale is told simply and charmingly through a mixture of physical theatre, haunting music and deliberately homespun special effects. The aesthetic may not be entirely original, but it is captivating and slickly executed. Gorgeous wordless sequences imaginatively capture the exhausting, epic journey of Crab and her companions, while smoothly executed flashbacks introduce a striking cinematic element.    

Beautiful as it looks, however, the time that has clearly been put into the show’s appearance is at the expense of any real meat to flesh out its attractive skeleton. For a piece with storytelling at its heart, the story itself is weak in places, with no real motor to drive it forward. The strange fantasy world that Antler Theatre inhabits is lightly sketched, and why Crab feels so compelled to chase the horizon is anyone’s guess.

The production’s playful spirit and the charisma of its clearly talented performers carry it through despite these flaws, but its sweet brand of storytelling remains decidedly slight. Amid the Fringe’s annual flood of whimsy and physical theatre, Antler Theatre never quite do enough to set themselves apart.