Review: Motorway, ZOO Playground

Sometimes it’s hard being a reviewer. Yes, we get to see so many amazing shows for free, yes, we’re often plied with free booze to lubricate us into giving an extra star and yes, we get our egos massaged seeing our reviews quoted on posters. But I’m telling you, sometimes it’s hard because sometimes you see a show like Motorway and you’re expected to write a review that makes some sense of it all. Trust me, making sense is the one thing I am struggling with as I step out of ZOO Playground 2. What I really need is some of that free booze, or maybe some drugs. Yes drugs, the type Lucy was snorting and offering to half the audience (the two young girls sitting beside me were delighted by the offer, I hope their parents aren’t reading this!). 

But ok, a review is demanded and a review you will get. Except… except… except… just what the?… Motorway is without doubt the strangest thing I have seen for some time. Perhaps since Christopher Brett Bailey’s Pyschodrama, a reference more relevant when I see Brett Bailey mentioned as part of the show’s E15 development! His weirdness has clearly rubbed off on writers Daniel Cuckow and Abigail Sinclair. 

But yes, a review is demanded. So, here goes. 

Maeve (Samantha Begeman) and Lucy (Sinclair) work in a cafe on a major but quiet road. It’s opposite the secret military base where Maeve’s boyfriend Felix (Dominic Bryant) works. It’s a dead-end job in a dead-end place and no one ever actually comes in anymore anyway. To pass the time the pair chat and play and occasionally get visited by Felix or the strange Dr Moore (Cuckow), with his obsession for as much sugar as his coffee can absorb.  

At first, it appears as if it will be a story about two best friends growing up together and how the bonds of friendship can be torn apart as their lives change. Lucy clearly has mental health and drug issues going on, Maeve has a brain injury from a childhood accident, so both are a little quirky from the very start. But then it veers off in all directions. It gives the M6’s Spaghetti Junction a run for its money on how many different directions you can go! It really kicks in after Lucy and Maeve see a bright light in the sky, and there’s plenty of hints towards an alien encounter. But the beauty is how vague it all remains, leaving us to wonder if it’s real or just part of some strange dream; perhaps it’s Maeve’s brain injury, perhaps it’s Lucy’s drug intake! It’s all left so open for interpretation that I’m sure every member of the audience will give you a different understanding.   

But this lack of absolute clarity is its beauty. It doesn’t matter that we never fully understand. Because the production is just stunning, from its performers to its lights to its sound. Begeman and Sinclaire are just sublime as the two friends, one moment playful, the next at each other’s throats accusing the other of copying them, of stealing their ideas, their dreams. And if the script is wacky, so is the presentation. The structure is all over the place, at times Lucy is sitting in the audience whispering secrets to us or breaking into random song.  

All this is to simply say Motorway is utterly bizarre yet completely compelling. It’s meaning is ambiguous. It’s the buzz of speeding at 100 miles an hour down the motorway hoping to hell this ride is never going to end, or at least not in complete carnage. 

Written by: Daniel Cuckow and Abigail Sinclair 
SFX, props and lighting design by: Holly Demaine and Clare McLoughlin 

Motorway plays at ZOO Playground 2 until Saturday 30 August as part of EdFringe.