Zinnie Harris’ new play is a powerful and, at times, shocking drama about warfare, parenthood and survival. It starts with a bang when sisters Beatriz and Rosa’s rural Spanish idyll is shattered by the coming of soldiers, the outbreak of war with France, the condemnation of a local man for fraternising with the enemy and the discovery of his six-year-old daughter. Unexpectedly faced with the burden of the young girl, plucky Beatriz sets out to find her father, but this quest proves considerable more epic than she could possibly imagine as the odd couple venture across vast acres of land and time.
What begins as a realistic piece becomes a parable of warfare as the characters journey through history and war zones, picking up other abandoned children on the way, from WWI to Vietnam and beyond. The first half is impressively gripping but towards the end the message of the play became unclear. There are echoes of Lionel Shriver’s ‘We Need to Talk About Kevin’ and Flann O’Brien’s ‘The Third Policeman’, but, unlike in these works, it is harder to really fault Beatriz for the actions of her young companion. So, what is the piece trying to say? That war brutalises children? That those who survive do so at the expense of others?
Nevertheless, the performances are impressive, the quality of writing is undeniable and the relentlessly dark tone is often counter-balanced by an earthy humour. It’s not for the faint-hearted but it is a challenging and thought-provoking piece of drama.
4/5 
Sam Laydon
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