Written by Hannah Caplan

Directed by Douglas Clarke-Wood

Review by Marina Funcasta

Summerhall – Former Women’s Locker Room

Leaving Hannah Caplan’s debut play ‘This is not about me’, I struggled to admit that it really wasn’t. That is, about me. Tying together some classic thematic threads of the coming-of-age genre, the relatability and insight of Caplan’s script is hard to overstate. She constructs a web of intimacy for her characters, ensnaring us along with them in sticky, blurry metatheatrical traps.

And walking out isn’t an option, for us or for our pair, Grace and Eli. But is it all down to love? It certainly seems that way. Neither can extrapolate themselves from each other’s lives – in nearly a decade of friendship, they know too much, seen too much. No matter the years of no contact, or reintroductions, our couple spring back towards each other, like an elastic band…

It is perhaps this circular structure that brings Grace, played with delicious subtlety by Amaia Naira Aguinaga, to take Eli, and their relationship, as her muse. A writer, the script becomes her tapestry, and we are watching it disentangle in real time. Like a modern-day Arachne. Francis Nunnery is a charming male lead, mastering a sweet timidity which complements Aguinaga’s ferociousness. Very much multi-dimensional characters, Caplan’s investment does seem to side slightly with Aguinaga: this world is on her terms, and as narcissistic as she may, it is unapologetically vibrant and effervescent. Aguinaga matches her characters’ defiance with fearless determination: exploring tonal and emotional avenues of her character’s mind, we don’t need much more evidence to convince us of her talent. Indeed, having already stunned Summerhall last year with her performance in The Chaos That Has Been and Will No Doubt Return, she is definitely one to watch.

Walking out is also definitely not an option in a literal sense also. Staged in the Women’s Locker Room, the tight traverse establishes such an intimacy that even the pair’s most distant moments feel intense. In response to this unavoidable intensity, Douglas Clarke-Wood directs the pair to make extensive use of the space: Aguinaga darts from one corner of the room to another, tying threads together between the walls, meanwhile Nunnery (less chaotic of the two) stands till. An understandable decision, but one that felt a bit messy, and perhaps jarring at points. Indeed, partitioned by a bed as their only set piece, at times it appears an obstacle separating the two camps, buttressing a clunky no mans land.

This said, the design is captivating. Caplan’s care and attention to detail is strewn across every element of this play. Having done the set design herself, everywhere you look you are reminded of Caplan’s care and talent. From the projections, to the poems, to the threaded webs which adorn the walls, to the bed linen, to puppets, to supermarket materials, every inch of the production is handcrafted and homemade. It is for this reason that I think this play had such an engulfing effect on me: everything involved seemed to exude love for the craft and for live performance. Whilst I do believe Caplan’s script has a certain cinematic feel to it, I am beyond glad to have caught her show in the flesh, feeling its heart beat one line at a time.

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