Harold Pinter's 1978 play is a forensic search for a treacherous affair's beginning. And because the story is told in reverse, it triggers that devastating poignancy common to all plays which reveal their characters damaged futures before we see their pasts.
In Ian Rickson's production the trysts take place in shabby rooms with peeling wallpaper. Yet although Kristin Scott Thomas's rather passive Emma is the fulcrum, she is oddly not the focus. Nor is her naïve lover Jerry (Douglas Henshall).
Rather it is Ben Miles's Robert, Emma's husband and Jerry's best friend, who defines the evening.
Miles gets exactly right that Pinteresque sense of rage existing beneath civility. But because the affair comes across as a series of controlled decisions rather than impulsive acts, you never quite care about the lovers' predicament as you should.
