Review: Clean Slate, Edfringe

Clean Slate has a simple setup that evolves into a stunning show; writer and performer Louisa Marshall stands at a sink while the audience dutifully files in and sits down around her. The energy Marshall projects is felt immediately, the waves of stress and irritation of many a put-upon girlfriend radiating out from her as she details precisely just how oafish and immature the man she hopelessly devotes herself to is – and for the duration of the show, you are that boyfriend.

No one particular audience member is focused on as there is solidarity here; it’s the audience as a collective that become Marshall’s unfortunate manchild, one person at a time plucked out to help set up impossible IKEA furniture, another to hide under the covers during one of the couple’s rare little sweet moments (which the boyfriend inevitably ruins of course) and another asked to justify just why their shared flat is in such a dire and messy state.

This all rests heavily on Marshall’s performance, yet she carries the whole show with ease and gives an exceptional performance that wins sympathy, adapts to every bizarre audience interaction and finally makes the whole room quiver in their chairs when her ire is provoked. It’s a delight to witness, and Marshall is equally to be credited for helping to craft a wonderful structure for her performance alongside director Amber Charlie Conroy. There’s an intelligence and energy underpinning everything that, when combined with an impressively mobile set by Ali Hagan, makes for one of the best productions I’ve seen so far in Edinburgh.

It’s a show with some variability of course, thanks to the amount of audience input involved, and this can sometimes disrupt an otherwise ideal pacing. Additionally Marshall’s character is oddly more sympathetic and less unhinged than one might anticipate from the early minutes, very quickly feeling like a woman close to the edge; one whose burdens are already too much of a strain and will eventually break her back, only for the eventual climax to work out more sad and muted than ‘hell hath no fury’.

It’s a definite character choice that supports the show’s innovative and flexible narrative structure, and throughout the runtime, you’re sure to feel every one of the highs and lows that come from the most joyously dysfunctional relationships. Run to see it if you can, just try to make sure you can spell ‘beef bourguignon’ before you do.

Written by Louisa Marshall & Amber Charlie Conroy
Directed & Produced by Amber Charlie Conroy
Design by Ali Hagan
Producing Consultants: The Project People

Clean Slate runs at Summerhall as part of the Edinburgh Fringe until Monday 25 August.