The Chaos That Has Been and Will No Doubt Return review

This latest is delivered with genuine verbal and physical swagger. Think Steven Berkoff’s East crossed with a grimy, anti-lyrical Under Milkwood and you have something of the flavour of this odyssey into the underbelly of Luton. The Chaos That Has Been and Will No Doubt Return is a sharp, funny show stuffed full of memorable characters; it comes wrapped in a filagree of dirty poetry and real affection for its inhabitants, who are so desperately trying to get by and get on – even when the odds are stacked against them. Writer Sam Edmunds sees the life burning furiously inside of them.

The tale may not be entirely original, but it is told with real vigour and insight. It is played out at 100 miles an hour on Rob Miles’ functional but clever design, which gives it a comic-book vibe, by the young cast that doesn’t so much perform the script as give it a really good whack. I particularly liked Amaia Naima Aguinaga’s series of cameos, old and young.

It’s a show that reminds us that no one can know what the future holds and that it can change in a twinkling, for the worse and for the better. Edmunds never rose-tints, but as a writer he uses optimism as a radical act.