Anna Burnside reviews a production that's 'worth seeing for the sheer spectacle'.
As the audience arrives, creepy characters in white knickerbocker suits and huge conical hats hand out pencils. Their costumes are printed with letters, their expressions are blank.
At first, Please right back seems like a much more complicated show than it is. It’s a technical miracle, with actors interacting with projections in an extraordinary moving picture book come to life. A mysterious man has lost his briefcase, and his two children are on a quest to help him find it.
Turns out that the children’s mysterious father is actually in prison and his fantastical story, taking in lions, psychopathic pirates, a crazy cocktail bar and the inside of a whale, is just his way of explaining his absence.
The alphabet kids are part of the second, more straightforward strand of the narrative. While dad’s inside, his family are visited by a patronising official from a government programme to prevent prisoners’ children from becoming offenders themselves.
This is the heart of Please right back: it’s not actually a kids’ cartoon as reimagined by Kafka but an extremely elaborate plea to support families and educate kids with compassion and care rather than rules and harsh discipline.
And if this message can get a bit lost among the amazing visuals and animation, it’s worth seeing for the sheer spectacle.
Please right back is part of this year’s Edinburgh International Festival and performs at The Studio until August 11, 2024.
Photo by Andrew Perry.
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