The War Next Door

Synopsis

Sophie and Max are a thoroughly modern British couple, cosmopolitan and open-minded. They have even constructed their own eco loo, well, it does save thirty litres of water a day. Max is a lawyer, albeit a lawyer who grows his own dope. Then there's Hana and Ali next door - neighbours, but in every other sense, a world apart. Hana is pregnant, but black eyes are not normally a symptom of pregnancy. What a man does on his own patch is his business - but when war starts raging next door, whose business is that?

Our Review:

6 February 2007

If you hear a terrible row next door, followed by clear evidence of brutal violence, what do you do? When is the right moment to intervene? And by so doing, are you helping the victim or salving your own conscience?

These are the questions posed by Tamsin Oglesby’s ambitious but slight (only eighty minutes running time) new play, and the situation of neighbourly conflict is clearly intended to run a metaphorical parallel with the American and British intervention in Iraq. The missing element, of course, is that sorting out domestic violence is in no way truly comparable to military action with a clear political objective, despite director Nicolas Kent’s best efforts to escalate the stage temperature in the climactic conflagration.

The sleek, minimalist, neutrally expensive-looking design by Libby Watson presents two adjacent London homes and gardens, where Ali and Hana, of unspecified Middle Eastern origins, are locked in a culture clash with Max and Soph, a do-goodin...

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