Kichensinkdrama

Cube, Project Arts Centre

★★★★☆

For a play that deals with insomnia, depression and trauma, this has a great quirkiness and moments of levity. Brian Bennett’s 50-minute piece — he performs in it as well as having written it — is set in a room carpeted with Post-it notes as he obsessively and repetitively attempts to sleep. He’s writing his memories and thoughts on the Post-its, interspersed with cups of chamomile tea and sleeping tablets. And still he wakes.

Change is initiated by the entry of a fox into this nocturnal scenario. A talking, assertive, nosy fox at that, played with élan by Margaret McAuliffe. Aesop’s foxes are often shrewd and cunning, but here she’s wise and no-nonsense. The interplay between them is sparky and surreal and illuminating.

Presented by the Collective, and directed with a light, charming touch by Ronan Phelan, Kitchensinkdrama is described as “an experimental new play with a lot of mystery and no plumbing”: it is not in the kitchen and there are elements of the supernatural. The tale could be imagined, or a dream, or Brian’s distressed mind playing tricks. Or maybe it’s real. A tasty morsel.

Runs at Project Arts Centre, Dublin 2, until Saturday, September 24, as part of Dublin Fringe Festival