Review: ASYLUM KING, Collective Theatre

It was probably a dark, rainy night when Francesca Marlowe came across the mysterious case of the dead asylum seeker. Plumes of vape smoke flowing from her nostrils, she turns the facts over in her head. The man had not been in the country long, or at least not long enough to accumulate deadly enemies. The coroner’s report had all the right words in all the right places but looked about as truthful as an election manifesto. And, to cap it off, the corpse was found in a locked room after some days had passed. 

Before Raymond Chandler’s lawyers reach for the phone, it is worth noting that Paz Koloman Kaib and Ahon Collective’s Asylum King steers only so far into hard-boiled territory before veering off into a story set in the here and now. This Marlowe is an investigative reporter (not be a PI) but they are possessed with their namesake’s devil-may-care swagger, moral compass and the typically brusque approach to finding the truth that wins few fans. 

Asylum King is staged in the basement of Collective Theatre, the kind of concrete box that Philip Marlow is involuntarily taken to by the baddie at least once per book after the former sticks his nose in too far and the latter has questions of their own. Austrian actor Sophie Lenglinger plays the intrepid hack with heaps of style and an intrepid stab at a Californian accent. Quite why that brogue is required is all part of the mystery considering that this particular braintickler is set not in the Hollywood Hills but in the North of England.

As the asylum hotel receptionist caught between his conscience and his wallet, Güney Akis plays Aaron with a sturdy conviction that shines through the cliched dialogue. Able to put on an anguished face that should be used to front every charity campaign going, Aaron is put through the moral wringer and eventually chooses to help Marlowe understand the morass of corruption and profiteering that led to the asylum seeker’s death.

The third wheel to this affair is nominally the villain of the piece. Tommy (Tom Ray) is the kind of right-wing video-blogger whose anti-migrant screeds call to mind those of the man known to his fans as Tommy Robinson (and to the courts as Stephen Christopher Yaxley-Lennon). Every night, he records live from outside the asylum hotel demanding to know why these “scroungers” deserve a better life than those whose towns they live in. In a bravura move, we get to see Tommy’s home life and the factors feeding into his world view: his unemployment in a town with very few jobs, his mother at the mercy of a dodgy landlord and the impotent rage he feels about both that is channelled into his TikTok rants.

Arguably the real "villain" of the piece is alluded to only in the title and not named in person, even if his organisation is. Founded by billionaire Graham King (dubbed by the media as “the asylum king”), Clearsprings Ready Homes began a 10-year contract with the Home Office in 2019 to provide asylum hotels; by the time it ends, that contract will have raked in around £7bn from the taxpayer and far more than originally expected. Between 2020 and 2023, there were 153 deaths at asylum hotels run by Clearsprings and its two competitors Searco and Mears but a report from campaign group Liberty suggests that the mortality rate among Clearsprings residents was significantly higher. 

Even with the fluent direction and the excellent performances from all three actors, the writing is the weakest point of this chamber piece. The narrative ambition here is open to question. Whether Asylum King is intended as a stylised parable of modern greed or to cast a caustic sideways glance at the practices of Clearspring is unclear (possibly for legal reasons). Why Marlowe, her trenchcoat and her accent have been transplanted from the rainsoaked streets of Hollywood to the rainsoaked streets of this unnamed northern town is also vague. 

The concept is muddied somewhat by a last minute character jump: with a waggle of an eyebrow and a declaration that “the game is afoot”, Francesca suddenly crosses over into Sherlock Holmes territory. And then there’s an abrupt fade-to-black finale which is less reminiscent of The Sopranos’ and more of a sudden power cut. 

When the lights do go up, I can almost hear Chandler’s detective whispering in my ear that, even if Asylum King doesn’t add up, it has the kind of ending nobody argues with. In this tale of hidden figures more interested in the income than the outcome and a reporter’s futile fumble with the fickle mistress called truth, it’s that final kick in the pants that resonates the most. 

Asylum King continues at Collective Theatre as part of Collective Fringe until 25 January.