Four years ago, a young company called A2 sent me a pair of knickers to publicise their first show, a story of female friendship with an intriguing title. I wore the knickers, but never got to see that show, although I have since caught other work by the A2 duo, Alit Kreiz and Anton Mirto.
Finally, courtesy of the London international mime festival, I have a chance to catch up with it, and very nice it is, too. A2's shows are characterised by a tough charm; they are sweet without ever being fey.
Miss, Did It Hurt When You Fell Down From Heaven? has overtones of fairytale, particularly Rapunzel, and the teasing burlesque of the emotional and physical striptease. It is about the loss of childhood innocence and the bruises of adult experience. There is game-playing and arm-wrestling, pink dreams and saliva, oneupwomanship and deep shared affection. Like A2's last show, All Those People I Have Met, it is about how we forge our identities. It is about trying things on and taking things off - this company must have a wholesale knicker supplier.
"Tell me you love me," says one of the women. "What sort of sound are you looking for?" "It doesn't really matter as long as it sounds real." The quest for authenticity is at stake throughout the show, and piquancy is added by the fact that this is only a piece of theatre, and yet is also a very real manifestation of the two women's relationship.
Kreiz and Mirto have vowed to perform the piece every year for the rest of their lives as a kind of living diary that records the changes in their relationship. But what happens if they fall out irrevocably or one of them dies? It is these questions that hover unspoken over 60 intimate and fragile minutes that are both appealing and slightly frightening because there is so much at stake.
