Testing the Echo

Synopsis

What is the population of Scotland? Where did Father Christmas originate? How do you feel about men holding hands? Who was Martin Luther King? What should you do if you spill someone's drink...? In most Western countries, to become a citizen you have to take an exam. Fascinated by the way these tests create a portrait of our nations' identities and beliefs. David Edgar charts the twisted journey from alien to citizen.

Our Review:

7 April 2008

David Edgar’s first play for Out of Joint, completing a tour at the Tricycle in Kilburn this month before going on to the Birmingham Rep for a few days in May, is both fast and funny in its discussion of what it might mean to be British if you are applying for the status of citizenship.

Testing the Echo, like David Hare’s The Permanent Way for the same company, takes the pulse of the nation in the fragmentary dramatic form of sharp scenes, filmed insets, quick changes of character, minimal scenery and a dizzying amount of information.

Hare’s play was about the railways and grief, privatisation and civic responsibility. Edgar isolates two narrative strands – the ideological crisis of a young Muslim abducted “for his own good,” and the domestic tensions in an oppressive marriage – which are fused into the possibility of change at a government-sponsored English class, itself leading to an idea of assimilation and an oath of allegiance to the Queen...

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Latest User Review

kilburncat - 4 April 2008:

I meant to give it 2* (for the acting-nothing else) but the WOS code thing confounded me. This is to level things out....

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