A ticking bomb and a beating heart make a similar sound. In this latest piece from animated theatre-makers the Ding Foundation, a man returns to a house where an unexploded bomb has lain for many years, and detonates memories. The past is excavated and turns out to be dangerous.
The Ding Foundation is the squirrel and magpie of the theatre world - collecting and rescuing abandoned objects, and all the debris and detritus of other people's lives, and animating them in order to tell stories. Old stair struts suddenly come alive, chairs walk and threaten each other, bits of wood become the arms and legs of a baby, a romper suit is whipped off the washing line and transformed into a child. Parents treat the child's body like the rope in a tug of war.
At its very best, it is like watching a series of little hauntings. There are no words in Unexploded Bomb, but plenty of atmosphere and a soundscape, both playful and sinister, which underscores the idea of past and present colliding and shattering so that secrets can be unearthed and examined.
The cleverness of the object animation sometimes gets in the way of the emotion, and although the piece only lasts just over an hour, the early pace is too slow, suggesting that the material is stretched a mite thin. You get the sense of a work in progress and a company yet to really push itself to the limits. But it wouldn't take much to tip what is currently curious and intriguing into the realm of the theatrically explosive.
· Until July 18. Box office: 020-7223 2223.
