PLAY REVIEW: Speak of The Devil ★★
There is something inherently theatrical about a delayed train: strangers thrown together, polite conversation filling the silence, and the creeping suspicion that something is not quite right. Unfortunately, despite a promising premise, Elise Simond’s Speak of the Devil struggles to turn its intriguing ingredients into a genuinely gripping piece of drama. Set aboard a train to Penzance, the play follows a group of passengers whose mundane journey takes an increasingly sinister turn. As conversations unfold and unsettling details emerge, the everyday begins to give way to something altogether more surreal. Simond clearly has an eye for the uncanny, but the production too often mistakes portentousness for genuine tension. The central problem lies in the writing. Personal stories emerge with little natural prompting, making exchanges feel like convenient vehicles for exposition rather than believable encounters between strangers. Characters remain frustratingly thin, while r...
