Oh how these thespians love a little injoke. How they delight in the opportunity to poke fun at theatrical convention. A century ago JM Barrie did it charmingly in Peter Pan when Peter implores the audience to save Tinkerbell's life by shouting aloud that we do believe in fairies.
Now American playwright Neil LaBute does it rather more brutally in Tits and Blood, a story of internet stalking in which we the audience may have the chance to save a girl's life if we would only shout loud enough or leap up on stage and smash the fourth wall. Except of course we know that what's going on is only acting, so why would we want to take responsibility?
Written especially by LaBute for the students of Washington and Lee University and getting its European premiere here in Edinburgh, this double bill concludes with a curious theatrical game along the lines of Whose Line is it Anyway?, in which the audience is asked to guess which of the stories told by four actors is a lie. But we know that they are all fictions written by the playwright, so what's the point?
The trouble with this kind of theatrical game-playing is that it is indeed only a game and one that could have rather unpleasant consequences for this young, inexperienced troupe if word gets round what is going on and hordes descend determined to derail the script. After all, as LaBute himself might put it, fuck over the audience and they just might start fucking you.
· Until Aug 20. Box office 08452 262721.
