The Plot ****

Writer-Director Emma Howlett writes a portrait of a family in The Plot – a razor-sharp dissection of power and its execution. 

Following two real-life conspirators in the Gunpowder Plot, Robert and Thomas, the play is a wordy, austere examination of this event. It takes place in a time when a king's power was exercised in the mutilation of a criminal's body — to commit a crime was to injure the body of the state, to 'shed its blood', so to speak. Thus, the state's reaction was natural; to shed your blood in revenge. 

It's a harrowing piece in this regard — eschatologies of salvation versus damnation are brought to visually striking life in Ellie Wintour's monochromatic set. Like the aftermath of a fire, ashes are one of the most important notions in the work. 

Sophie Kean and Abby McCann have a lot to do, sketching multiple narratives over the seventy-five minutes. They do a great job at this, although their Robert and Thomas are the most compelling. A version of the work with a slightly larger cast might define the multiple threads of the work with a little more clarity. 

Not to say Howlett's direction isn't well-worked. There are moments of sharp inhale — work is well realised with water, with Wintour's expansive centrepiece, with the brutal, beautiful language of the play itself. It's always great to see a talk-y play with a genuine love of language at the Fringe, and this is certainly one of those. It's not afraid to be cerebral, and to be honest on one watch elements of the play might be lost on an audience giving anything less than full focus, but the main juxtapositions — between state and criminal - conspirator and conspired against — between player and played — are all there.

What a strange thing it is, that in the passage of history we have become completely used to burning effigies of men who we have no interest in listening to. How strange it is that we do not remember most their names, nor the mutilation and execution of a young man not even twenty years old. But this is the nature of power — there was once a time when men were mutilated not only through the body but through their legacy too.

The Plot is a smartly written testament to this, and its core image — a voice describing the pain of a hanging, drawing and quartering — a flame flickering — a brutal installation of burnt metal and ashen floors — these moments have a beautiful theatricality. This one's worth a watch at Fringe.

Summerhall, until August 31^st.