Point of Yes
Smirnoff Underbelly, Edinburgh Festival Fringe

Group: Janey Godley

James Gledhill

What's the point? Any play that includes the disclaimer 'I know you've heard all this before, but not from me' in its opening lines is going to have to work hard to prove that it has one.

Unfortunately this one-woman piece about heroin addiction, which interweaves two monologues, fails ultimately to justify its existence by bringing a new perspective to bear on the issue. Written from personal experience by a first-time performer, the personal narratives are delivered with undeniable energy and conviction and are leavened by occasional flashes of dark humour.

The switches between two characters - one a world-weary landlady, the other a manic younger woman - help sustain interest, but the writing fails to rise above the level of well-worn cliché. The misery and disillusionment of inner-city Glasgow life, the orgasmic thrill of shooting-up for the first time, the inevitable tragedy of addiction and decline: I felt like I'd heard it all before. In fact it was just the sort of thing I was aspiring to in post-Trainspotting adolescent angst-ridden English essays. The tempo and imagery were disappointingly predictable.

Where a successful monologue will offer a slow revelation of dark secrets, or a gradual sense of a character's self-delusion, this was comparatively guileless. When you lay your cards on the table from the first line there's really nowhere left to go. A familiar litany of contemporary woes reinforces the grim impression of deprived inner-city existence. It's writing by numbers, with tales of child abuse, teenage sex, battered wives and prostitution interspersed with black and white projections of dilapidated street scenes.

Attempts are made to tie in the personal stories with broader world events - one character watches the wedding of Charles and Diana and muses on the fact that she's the same age as the bride; just as 'our boys' are dying in the Falklands, they're also dying on the streets of Glasgow. This incidence of 'chemical warfare' is even juxtaposed with events in Iraq. It all feels a bit forced, a nod to the need to situate the characters in a broader context but with no real idea of how this sheds light on their experiences.

While Point of Yes does have the benefit of an authentic voice and evocation of place, one can't help feeling that the theme, like a junkie's scarred forearm, once offered rich veins of possibilities which are now largely exhausted. While these depressing experiences remain the stuff of countless individual's everyday existence, they've lost their power to shock and a performer needs to do more than simply bear witness to their own experiences.

The question is left hanging in the air: how can one bring a fresh approach to these issues?

31 July to 24 August.

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