How do you fix a relationship when numbness sets in? Hayley, a hotshot, perfectionist management consultant, is shacked up with Steve, an IT engineer. But their partnership of eight years is on the skids: 'I don't tingle anymore,' says Hayley.
Both are drifting towards strange kinds of courtships with clients. What's more, both are suffering from a mysterious form of paralysis that resembles Repetitive Strain Injury. Soon, unable to use their hands, they're reduced to slurping food through straws.
Laura Wade's drama attempts to use technology as a prism for an analysis of modern living and asks whether relationships, like computers, have a built-in obsolescence. But Wade, who won last year's Critics' Circle Award for Most Promising Playwright, stumbles slightly with this play. It runs out of momentum and is never quite as keen-edged as her Breathing Corpses, or as touching as Colder Than Here.
Still, despite a niggling feeling that Other Hands was written solely to satisfy the demand for a new play, it's a likeable piece of work: the playwright hasn't lost her touch for wryly amusing dialogue. Bijan Sheibani's production imparts a sense of lives choked by frustration and loneliness.
Katherine Parkinson gives a beautifully abashed performance as the kindly, slightly daffy Lydia, who strikes up a tentative friendship with Steve. And Anna Maxwell Martin's success-obsessed, anally-retentive Hayley reminds us that even the most capable people sometimes need rescuing.
Until Mar 11, Soho Theatre And Writers Centre, 21 Dean Street W1, Mon to Sat 7.30pm, Sat mats 4pm, £15 to £20, £12.50 to £15 concs, mats £7.50. Tel: 0870 429 6883. www.sohotheatre.com Tube: Tottenham Court Road/ Piccadilly Circus
Other Hands
