Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
Cast: Luke Barton, Jill Rutland.
Behind locked doors nobody knows what horrors a family can be put through, what nightmares one family member can wreck upon another; it is the last vestige of unexplored horror because nobody quite knows how to deal with it when it might be apparent but nobody reports it.
The domestic horror touched upon by writers such as Stephen King in books like Delores Claiborne or Rose Madder only truly briefly catch the point of the madness that dwells in the confines of the home and the abuse that can go unheard; it is too much perhaps to suspect that even in horror, the family unit might be subjected to such torture is best left undisturbed, best left as Echoes in the dark.
Directed by Ross Drury, Echoes takes the domestic horror down a path that is truly chilling and in which both actors, former University of Liverpool student Luke Barton and the superb Jill Rutland, excel within the tightness of the stage and the squared off angles afforded by the different sightlines of Zoo’s downstairs theatre. It is a remarkable thing for an audience to witness such a performance when the truth of what they are seeing can slightly be perceived as a shift when seen from a different position.
It is that position, that question of dominance and control that is sought out in Echoes, the uncertainty of just who is actually the one having difficulty and the one who has snapped, who has lost their grip on reality and their moral fibre.
Echoes is extraordinary because of the way the two actors deal with each other on the stage, the harm that is meted out in dramatic terms is one that will have audiences wincing and averting their eyes at the point where the abuse becomes all too clear. It is clever, it is crafted rebellion because it makes the person in the crowd wonder exactly it is that they are shying away from and whether they would continue to turn a blind eye if it was going on next door to them.
A fantastic piece of Edinburgh Fringe theatre, a must see of the festival this year.
Ian D. Hall