After last week's gentle comedy – Astonishing Archie, written by and starring Bill Paterson – the last A Play, A Pie and A Pint offering before panto season is altogether more experimental, but no less engaging fare.
A modern-day take on Arthur Schnitzler's La Ronde written by postgraduate television writing students at Glasgow Caledonian University, it features 10 loosely interconnected vignettes of dangerous – and not so dangerous – liaisons.
Cutting across class borders and sexual tensions, they eventually come full circle through the baton of a £10 note bearing the cryptic message "Take me if you need me" being passed from one to the next. Directed by Graeme Maley, the round robin scenarios are played out in white face by the fine cast of Isabelle Joss, Mark Wood and Iain Robertson.
The nature of each segment signposted on cue cards ("Lovers: Forger and Waitress"; "Crash: Banker and Layabout"), it begins with Robertson's ex-con trying to exchange the note for forgiveness from a vicar, and ends with him working as cabbie and confronting the class divide when he rubs shoulders with a fat-cat tycoon. In between, the play runs through a gamut of emotions and social situations covering religion, hope, finance, love and disappointment.
Intriguing and comic by turns, the style and structure of the piece may not be to everybody's taste, but it never fails to hold the attention and Robertson, in particular, is in excellent form. His high-falutin' art forger is an absolute joy.
Admittedly the quality of writing on show is varied, but as the title suggests there's plenty to take away from the piece.
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