Your Last Breath (Salford)

Venue: The Lowry
Where: Salford

Describing their work as “innovative theatre”, the aptly named Curious Directive’s intriguing and imaginative show Your Last Breath fits this bill perfectly.

Telling four seemingly unrelated stories from four different time periods, the show ties together the fates of a young cartographer, a bereaved business woman, a victim of a skiing accident and a scientist. The tales are set against the backdrop of the vast and snowy mountains of Norway, an idea that somehow becomes crucial to the ideas of connectedness and isolation that emerge throughout the piece.  

Stylistically, there is a great deal happening on stage here. There is a live pianist underscoring the entire show, projections, voiceover, physical theatre and naturalistic dialogue. Technically seamless, these elements are certainly exciting, though sometimes perhaps at the expense of clarity and overshadowing the complicated narrative.

That said, some of the visual devices here are exceptionally unique. The performers weave lengths of string to brilliantly illustrate the intangible, creating giant cats’ cradles, mental landscapes and suspended moments.  

Navigating their devised world with precision and skill, the ensemble cast work confidently together, creating real moments of heightened wonder combining physicality, music and abstract techniques, despite some less engaging naturalistic moments.

Your Last Breath is quietly confident piece that doesn’t signpost the way for its audience, but rather leaves its door open, inviting them in into its world in their own time. This show feels rather like a magic eye picture; in the beginning, there is so much to concentrate on that it can feel difficult to decipher, before everything suddenly and wonderfully falls into place revealing an arresting and moving piece of work.

– Sara Cocker