EDINBURGH 2023: Review: DAZZLING, TheSpace

Tumbling into the depths of obsession and addiction, Holly Sewell’s play Dazzling is a personal, perceptive one-woman-show from a talented team.

Laying in her messy bedroom, we meet Alix (Charlie Scott-Haynes) as she complains about her boring summer school office job. Her story really starts, however, when she goes on a night out with straight male best friend Jan and meets Fiona. Alix and Fiona begin a whirlwind romance, but as Alix falls deeper and deeper the relationship takes over her life a little too much. 

Scott-Haynes is a very fine actor, nailing the solo show delivery style and effortlessly shifting between awkward comedy, giddy love, and crushing desperation. She does well at handling both the naturalistic and poetic aspects of the script, and is overall an impressively compelling storyteller.

Sewell’s script handles heavy topics with care and attention, without ever becoming too miserable. The best part of the writing is Alix and Jan’s friendship - there’s enough detail for them to feel specific, but the dynamic feels real and familiar to all best friendships. As Sewell explores the effect of mental health issues like severe depression on friendships, the writing really begins to shine. It’s also nice to see a story with a love interest that uses they/them pronouns, something still very rare in playwriting. 

There’s a reference to Fleabag in Dazzling, and the similarities are plenty. The show does fall into cliche every so often - it is the lack of sharp originality that prevents it from reaching the next level of success.

A good place for this originality to come in would be in the directing and design. The set (by Maddy Sanderson) is cluttered with furniture and rubbish, realistic to illustrate Alix’s depressive episode, but it would perhaps have been more effective to take a more abstract, creative approach to set Dazzling apart from the sea of dark solo shows. While it’s nothing revolutionary, Viv Wang’s direction is playful with a strong eye for detail. 

Dazzling could still do with a little development - the poetry/art theme isn't fleshed out enough to really add to the story, and while the representation of addiction and substance abuse is raw and moving, it perhaps needed a little more context and detail to fully land. With a few little fixes to the pacing, Alix's spiral into depression could have been more gradual and thus more harrowing. With all this said, the quality of the acting and writing here demonstrates real skill and real potential.

If you fancy an introspective, moving hour of theatre, Dazzling is one not to miss - I look forward to seeing what Sewell and team create next. 

Dazzling runs at theSpace (Niddry Street) until 22 August

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