Stefan and Akin have known each other since they were kids. They have walked the same grey London streets where Akin now lies; he looks as if he could be sleeping, but the blood blossoming across his chest tells another story. It was Stefan who wielded the blade in a frenzy of anger, but as Stefan turns fugitive he blames everyone but himself.
A play isn't just the words in the actors' mouths. It is also the context in which it is performed, where it is produced, and who it is produced by. The rough and ready Any Which Way - by David Watson, whose last play, Flight Path, was nominated for the John Whiting award - is performed by a cast of professional actors and ex-offenders promenade-style in an old Baptist church near King's Cross, and it has an electrifying immediacy. There are moments of quiet poetry as mothers talk of lost sons, as well as a chilling scene in a morgue when a young man talks of his need to carry a knife.
Though Maggie Norris's production is played indoors, Mic Pool's video allows it to capture the restless energy of the streets and housing estates, and the threatening physicality of the young male actors creates a genuine sense of danger. Sometimes the dialogue is hard to follow, and though ghosts walk, there is not a great deal to surprise in the scenario. But this show packs a punch, and in its final moments reminds us that the real victims of knife crime can't rise to take a bow at the end of the show.
