Family drama tries something few other theatre shows dare to attempt

Oran Mor, Glasgow, until Saturday

Four stars

Mother and son relationships are all too rarely explored in theatre, exceptions being the likes of Shakespeare’s warped adventures with Hamlet, Eugene O’Neill’s depressing Long Day’s Journey Into Night or Sophocles’ darkest of days’ Oedipus Rex.

That’s why when a production arrives that offers up a truer representation of the range of emotions experienced by a young mum and her fast-growing teen boy it really has to be celebrated.

Kim Allan and Ahron Ashraf star in Jellyfish, the last in the series of this season’s Oran Mor plays and it’s not hard to see why this drama won writer Katy Nixon this year’s David MacLennan Award.

The two-hander follows Anna and Robo as they set off a journey to Berlin, but it’s not simply a sightseeing tour. This heavily-layered adventure story sees Anna return to the world to which she once escaped when she abandoned her tiny son to be with the child’s father - despite the fact he had treated her so badly. For Robo, it’s an escape from present day reality, a teenager with his own relationship issues.

Jellyfish runs til Saturday (Image: free)In Berlin, mother and son visit the zoo and love the aquarium (we learn jellyfish can pause their ageing process; a fact screaming out to be motifed in the play) become separated after an argument, and it’s by chance they both undergo experiences that raise searing questions in their minds to volcanic level; why has each of them allowed their lives took the turns they did? What levels of sacrifice should a young mother make? It asks of the decisions we make as a younger person, and how they seem so self-destructive today. But of course, every (wrong) choice brings with it dramatic consequences.

Ultimately, it’s when the relationship between Anna and Robo – so close in years but not in their sense of responsibility – is stretched to breaking point that the pair can begin to access true feelings, their reality becoming exposed by the most dramatic set of circumstances.

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This is a powerful, testing play, carefully, cleverly directed by Brian Logan, that features dark language and violence, yet writer Katy Nixon’s talent is such she could break the fourth wall to continuously to not only offer easy access into the minds of the protagonists, but to allow shards of humour to pierce the dramatic darkness.

But at its heart is a love story – between mother and son – that forms a life-reaffirming play – which in turn informs audiences that lunchtime theatre isn’t simply an entertaining pastime. It’s a massive cultural resource.

In the process, Kim Allan offers up perhaps her very best dramatic performance on stage, with Ahron Ashraf comfortability on stage belying entirely the fact this is his first professional appearance on stage.

Jellyfish runs until Saturday