Edinburgh review: Interiors (Lyceum Theatre)

A dumbshow of a dinner party, Interiors takes place behind a transparent fourth wall, as Peter hosts an annual gathering for family and friends. We can’t hear a thing they all say, but we know exactly what each is thinking. A narrator’s voice relays their inner-lives. Their actions and reactions give them away.

Inspired by Belgian playwright Maurice Maeterlinck’s 1895 piece L’Intérieur, an early split-stage play that suggests ignorance is bliss, Interiors explores the divide between our private and public selves. As the party plays out, Scotland’s Vanishing Point exposes the appearances we keep up and the fronts we put on – some for politeness’ sake, some for personal protection.

The choreography – and it’s essentially a charade of realism – is wittily done. The comedy of manners becomes a silent, slapstick routine. Peter’s granddaughter adjusts her appearance in advance, finishing with a quick upskirt spritz of scent. Barbara’s always butting in on private jokes, while Barnaby and his girlfriend Aurora sneak conspiratorial looks in secret. Peter’s mind wonders off to the chair he’s kept empty; Davide’s to an ex-girlfriend. Newbie John remains an enigma. Director Matthew Lenton turns his theme over and over – private phobias, personal spaces, bodily functions and self-centricity all find their way in to the piece as they burst out of its people.

But Lenton extends the personal to the political, pushing us to consider the world beyond this bubble of comfort. Who’s allowed in and who’s excluded? Each guest arrives with a gun slung over their shoulder. They swill wine as they talk about those worse off. It’s a big, scary world out there. Finn Ross’s projections surround the house with stars.

Nonetheless, Interiors is a spider diagram of a piece; the sort that wants to show every side of its subject. Rather than honouring the truth of its situation, letting the dinner party play out and inner-lives emerge, Lenton crams as many exemplary incidents into its hour-twenty as possible. There are sing-a-longs before the starters, drinking games mid-main course and dance-offs pre-pudding. Also: Nosebleeds! Proposals! Despair! Because it never blossoms into surreality, Interiors starts to look impatient.

Pat, too. That narrator steps onstage – a woman in white, the ghost at the banquet – and looks on, mournfully, from outside. Lenton deploys that old trick of revealing each character’s eventual end as they leave the party: one week, one year, five, 40. The moral is to make the most of life (bleurgh) and share your real self while you still have the chance. Even the song choices – "Wherever I Lay My Hat", "Video Killed the Radio Star" – are superficially thematic. It’s rare to see existential angst played so enjoyably, but Interiors is also intensely irritating – an extended IKEA advert that’s rather pleased with itself and not half as profound as it thinks.

Interiors runs at the Lyceum Theatre at various times as part of the Edinburgh International Festival until 8 August.

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