Dirty Work (The Late Shift), Battersea Arts Centre review ★★★★★

Dirty Work (The Late Shift) at Battersea Arts Centre is as much a description of a show as it is one in its own right. Forced Entertainment has been making highly acclaimed and innovative devised work for almost 20 years, and Dirty Work, originally performed in 1998, is no exception. Whimsical and mystifying, dark and absurd, Dirty Work conjures up a saturated world of storytelling full of poignant musings.

Robin Arthur and Cathy Naden sit in two chairs on opposite sides of the stage and take turns describing a five-act play that encompasses riots, great 20th-century executions, a man who tells jokes whilst his hands burn in a fire, and other bizarre tales twisted and turned into one common narrative. Arthur and Naden are at times playful and competitive and at others desolate as their fantastical play heads to a disconcerting finale.

The production is as simple as their fictional play is complicated. Terry O’Connor sits in the back, sporadically playing the same record to accompany different parts of the narrative. The lighting is simple and mimics the costumes, with Arthur in a cyan blue shirt and Naden in a magenta dress. The overall effect is strangely bewitching, and the slow yet steady unwinding of events produces a trance-like vision. It’s a bizarre world, sometimes deeply funny, and sometimes utterly bleak.

If anything, it’s the small changes that detract from the overall piece. Naden stands in the middle only to sit back down, and O’Connor plays a new piece of music once towards the end, only to return to the familiar song later. And although it’s only 75 minutes, it’s still slightly too long for this format, offering most of its artistic potency within the first hour.

Forced Entertainment’s Dirty Work (The Late Shift) is not straightforward or even ‘entertaining’ theatre, but this accomplished company demonstrates its ability to experiment with theatrical boundaries. This UK premiere of an older work proves to be as compelling and enchanting as ever.