Fireface at the Young Vic

Perhaps so, but I would hazard a guess that Fireface would prove an exception to this rule. In the case of Fireface, we fear the worst and hope for the best.

The actors, already positioned on stage, look bored even as they waited for the audience to fill the theatre. A sense of boredom and frustration permeates throughout. A typical domestic scene unfolds; dinner time, mother and father not talking, their children arguing. This is hardly unexplored territory or original characterisation; an absent father, an overbearing mother and disobedient adolescents. Yet a sense of something untypical lurks below the surface, threatening to emerge.

The relationship between brother and sister, Olga and Kurt, begins juvenile and endearing. However, in this short play, it very quickly becomes something much more sinister. Whilst the audience knows that the actors are, in reality, unrelated, this still makes for very uncomfortable viewing. Their parents, distracted by their own concerns and neuroses, do not notice as their two children become increasingly disturbed. Until it is too late.

Olga, played by Aimeé-Ffion Edwards, provides the stand-out performance. She is entirely believable as the seemingly precocious, mature-before-her-time child, who is in fact deeply troubled and in need of rescue. The relationship between Olga and Kurt, played by Rupert Simonian, is compelling to watch.

There is a sense of self-indulgence to this play, just as there is with the children themselves. A less dramatic ending would conversely have been as – if not more – impactful. Yet the subtleties, the difficulties and pitfalls of modern-day family dynamics, are not lost. This is very much a play for our times.