Gregor (Timothy West) is a bomb disposal expert and undervalued special advisor to a British government fighting a war against terror. But our hero has plenty of unexploded bombs in his own life. One of these devices has just arrived in the shape of Mima (Carolyn Blackhouse), whom he loved and left 20 years previously. She is now unhappily married to Alastair (Tom Cotcher), who wants to make a documentary about Gregor - much to the delight of Gregor's wife of 35 years, Ann (Nichola McAuliffe), who has always felt neglected by a husband who put his job before his family.
Terry Mackay's play is slickly written, in TV style, but it is amateur stuff. This is the kind of messy play in which lots of unhappy, well-spoken people drink too much and spew their emotional entrails all over each other. It throws everything in - Gregor's emotional immaturity, his nagging wife's violence, how we should deal with terrorists, Mima's suicide attempt, Alastair's alcoholism - and then throws in some more: an accident with a bomb, sudden pregnancy, guilt. It isn't so much a play as an animated agony page. West is suitably repressed, while McAuliffe is suitably hysterical. This play may slip down smoothly in the Home Counties; on the Edinburgh Fringe, it looks as if a dinosaur has crashed the theatre.
· Until August 29. Box office: 0131-556 6550. Then touring.
