EDINBURGH 2018 - BWW Review, PASSIONATE MACHINE, Zoo Charteris

We are all time travellers in our own way. After all, a to-do list is essentially a message from a past self.

But what would happen if you started getting messages from a future version of you? That is the intriguing premise of Passionate Machine, a one-woman show written and performed by Dr Rosy Carrick.

Carrick presents herself as the ultimate fangirl, with a love for not just time travel movies, Rocky and David Bowie, but for Russian poet Mayakovsky. Her friends joke that, given a time machine, she would immediately proceed to abduct him from 1930 Moscow.

That sort of quip would not usually go any further, but Rosy receives a letter ostensibly from her future self, stranded in the past with a broken time machine, having attempted to follow through on a most excellent groupie adventure.

We follow Rosy's odyssey through her conviction that the letter is a prank, her resolution to investigate further just in case, and her quest to source an open-minded physicist through Gumtree, as she comes to personal realisations along the way and brings the show together in a moving conclusion.

A tightly plotted script is supported with strong production values, particularly the effective use of multimedia, which adds a touch of verisimilitude to Rosy's stories through email screenshots, highlighted passages from physics texts, and drunken selfies.

Indeed, with the show presented as a true story, this encourages you to go away and research elements of the production to find out just how true to life it is!

Carrick is a figure at once both intellectual - explaining wormhole theory with the aid of a slinky - and highly relatable - recounting blasting the spectacularly motivational theme to Rocky on the way to hand in her PhD thesis. Her engaging performance keeps the audience riveted throughout.

Science fiction has long been a lens through which we can explore our own reality, and Carrick has created a truly fascinating and empowering piece that uses familiar tropes to tell a touching personal story. Don't rely on a time machine - book to see it now!

Passionate Machine is at Zoo Charteris until 27 August

Get Broadway News on WhatsApp

Receive the latest updates, breaking news, and exclusive coverage from Broadway directly in WhatsApp.