Brooklyn-based Laura Eason is an acclaimed writer with notable hits to her credit, including the Netflix series House of Cards and a playful stage adaptation of Jules Verne’s Around the World in 80 Days (whose UK tour continues to the end of January). But she also took a critical lashing earlier this year for her two-hander Sex With Strangers. Remarkable Invisible, given its world premiere in Keswick, occupies a middle ground between these extremes.
The situation is ripe with dramatic potential: a family reunion. Adult brother Chris (materialistic, something in construction), and sister Astrid (a Unitarian minister), return from New York and San Francisco to help their downsizing parents pack up the family home. Time is short. Tensions surface, confrontations loom. Scenes in the family home are bracketed by discourses delivered to an unseen audience by father Peter, an astrophysicist turned paranormal researcher. Against a backdrop of a starry night sky, he ponders the impact of each individual on the cosmos.
Setting (designed by Bronia Housman) and dialogue are realistic but the drama never quite takes off, in spite of clear direction from Zoë Waterman and sensitive performances from the four-strong cast. Clashes and exchanges of confidences feel contrived, as does the mystery of the universe/individual metaphor, but the situation will strike a chord with any in the audience who have been through a similar family upheaval. Eason aims high but doesn’t quite achieve lift-off.
