Toast ****

A stage with a solitary chair awaits us. Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons is playing, signposting a highbrow event about to open. But no - we have been deceived, it’s nothing more than telephone hold music.

Jude Green is a jobbing actor, struggling to survive the harsh realities of today’s cost of living crisis. They are mostly unemployed - or occasionally working - that shade of grey always likely to put them at odds with administration systems that prefer certainties.

Their telephone conversations with Universal Credit do not go well. The idea that God is in the big and the small is clearly demonstrated here. Their credit has been iteratively reduced from £800 to zero, giving them an existential crisis. Yet rather than address the reasons for this and suggest options, the bureaucrat fixates on £15 worth of second-hand goods they have recently sold. Intermittently they are treated to reprises of Vivaldi.

Over to their acting agent. The private sector, with its necessary profit motive, will surely sharpen proceedings, won’t it? But this experience proves similar – a series of disjointed conversations, with inappropriate opportunities touted. A constant quandary for emerging actors is how to avoid being caught in the headshot trap: you won’t obtain work without decent ones, yet without work you can’t afford to pay for them. Worse still, the word that will wipe the smile from the cheeriest of acting faces: ‘exposure’. Exposure does not pay the bills.

But are these phone calls at all? Could this all be a theatrical audition?

The calls persist, with Green becoming increasingly frustrated, then fractious and even truculent, with an attempt to turn the tables on their tormentors.

Green’s performance is excellent, their comic timing sharp, in this at rimes absurdist comedy drama. They finds layers and frequently conveys their thoughts silently, but powerfully.

Toast contains various cultural references. While Kafka punctuates the narrative, the faceless voice suggests The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz, with the relentless and dispassionate grind of the state machine evoking Big Brother.

Some actors emerge from drama school with dreams of stardom, while others would just like to eke out a living. These aspirations are often crushed, with expectations lowered to more ‘realistic’ levels.

In this digital era, the information overload can be overwhelming to some members of society, with organisations increasingly hiding behind home working, fears of breaching GDPR legislation and reliance upon two-step authentication.

Toast shines a light on those in society who have been left behind, economically or falling foul of alleged technological advancements. Some people just can’t navigate the modern world.

Summerhall until 16^th August.