What have these two plays by Geoffrey Case and Ali Smith in common? Very little except that they combine a circular structure with a moral purpose and are presented as part of the admirable Shell Connections Youth Theatre season.
It's cheering to find the Olivier on a hot Monday night swarming with young people on and off the stage.
Of the two, I found Ali Smith's Just, presented by London's Kidbrooke school, the more arresting. It is like a cross between Monty Python and NF Simpson in which a young woman called Victoria finds herself falsely accused of bumping off a body stabbed with a pointed umbrella. She is instantly arrested by a dumb copper named Albert, found guilty by a blindfolded symbol of justice, Mrs Wright, and enthusiastically condemned by a manic chorus of grinning townspeople who chant: "She's not from round here. Send her down!"
The tone is lightly absurdist but Smith makes a number of serious points: that we live in an age of guilt by association, detention without trial and rabid consumerist conformity. But what gives the play its originality is its use of the versifying chorus who combine totemic worship of a pot plant with a hunger for scapegoats.
And, in Lucy Cuthbertson's sparky production, they are like a mad parody of middle England who are chilling and funny at the same time. I also warmed to Amy Russell as the defiant Victoria and Chris Peacock as the word-mangling rozzer who announces: "You killed this man in old blood."
Alongside this, Case's Samurai, vividly presented by the Flies On The Wall Youth Theatre from Stroud, seems more overtly moralistic: it is a sober oriental fable about a group of medieval citizens confronted, when deprived of a magical sword, by their own greed. The parallels with today are evident.
But what impresses most is Tessa Kemp's production, which looks like localised Kabuki with its use of silken banners and bamboo poles to symbolise mountains and forests. The actors too occupy the Olivier stage with a confidence that belies their years.
