This will have to be a very quick review. I haven't got time, you see. I need to get on to the next thing. There are all those plays out there I haven't seen yet, all those books I haven't read. A million per decade published in this country alone. Amazing, if you stop and think about it. Except that I haven't got time to stop and think about it.
Sometimes, like Victoria in Faster, I think I'd like to stop the world because I want to get off. Victoria was once a high-flying lawyer, but she dropped out and tuned into herself. She went to Australia, sat in front of Ayers Rock and contemplated that huge orange lump of eternity. Only, as she quite rightly points out, she is not an Aborigine, and she found when she got back to London that although she had slowed down, the rest of the world had sped up. As Victoria discovers, it is hard not to join in the race.
The most astonishingly confident debut show I've seen for a long time, this delightful (and speedy) piece from newcomers Filter takes its inspiration from James Gleick's book Faster: The Acceleration of Just About Everything. But there is nothing dry about this 70-minute show, which entwines factual information with a three-way love story between Victoria, her childhood friend Will and his business partner Ben.
Will and Ben are pitching to make a five-second advertisement for a pensions company, featuring the catchphrase: "Because life doesn't stop." It certainly doesn't for this toothsome threesome, who struggle to find time for contemplation, civility and even love in a world that is accelerating so fast that there is no time for latte, just a swift espresso.
The show, played on a bare stage with live music and songs, has a touch of Frantic's Tiny Dynamite in its romantic sensibility and a little of Improbable in its daring to be naff. That pays dividends in a cheeky, witty evening that has all the thrill of a rapid ride at the funfair, as well as the ache you feel in your heart when you know that something is missing from your life - even though you are right out in front in the fast lane.
· Until April 27. Box office: 020-7223 2223.
