The brilliance of Caryl Churchill's 2002 play starts with its title. "A number" could be a reference to one numeral - a singular item - but it also means an unidentified amount of things.
This tension between singularity and multiplicity is the play's theme. When Stuart Graham's Bernard says "a number" to his father, Salter (Alan Williams), he is referring to the indeterminate quantity of clones of himself that, apparently unbeknownst to the parties involved, were created at the time of his birth. This information sparks a crisis in both men: Bernard worries that multiple versions of himself may "damage his uniqueness", while Salter tries to control a flow of questions from his son that quickly reveal his complicity in the cloning process.
And that's just the first five minutes. Less than an hour long, this is a supremely economical piece of stage writing that raises enormous issues about identity, responsibility and love.
Keeping the production spare and simple seems a wise choice, but Annabelle Comyn has taken this too far: the actors' physical distance from each other and lack of movement lessen the tension and complexity of their exchanges. Williams spends the play seated in an armchair while Graham moves between two positions opposite him. This static approach is exacerbated by Williams' emotional underplaying: we get little sense of the moral and emotional roller-coaster the character negotiates as he watches his sons' lives flash before him.
Graham, by contrast, is a marvel of mutability as he transforms into three very different and equally credible versions of Bernard. One hopes that the production will even out during its run; Graham is currently offering one half of a world-class interpretation.
· Until March 3. Box office: (353) 1 878 7222.
