The revival of Bryony Laverys play that gets inside the mind of a paedophile serial killer is a chilling and engaging piece of work.
Im not a huge fan of monologues and each character has more than their fair share of telling the audience, that I found a little tedious; but the otherwise incredible tension and tight scenes shared between characters more than made up for this.
The play brings together the mother of a dead ten-year-old, the murderer and an American scientist who asks sin or symptom when it comes to the paedophile, Ralph (brilliantly acted by Jack James).
Lavery has a delicate touch; the mothers pain and struggle to get back a life devastatingly realistic while Ralph teetered between being intelligently convincing and truly autistic in his solipsistic removal from his crimes.
All the characters are frozen; Nancy cant move on from losing her daughter, Ralph lives in a world of plans, operations and trauma from childhood abuse and only at the end of the play to we find that the Scientist too is nursing a trauma that keeps her emotional clock from ticking.
The play is superbly crafted and the acting excellent. It is a pity that this is so let down by an incredibly drab and awkward set that did nothing to relieve the few moments of boredom I suffered during the many and lengthy monologues.
Cecily Boys reviewed this production at the York Theatre Royal Studio