The Author is a deeply self-referential piece of work, a play about actors and a writer featuring three actors and a writer. It poses the question “just how far will an actor go to shock the audience?” and then it sets out to answer it, Pirandello-style.

Arranged in an unusual format, which at first appeared as traverse, the set had the whole audience seated within the performance space facing each other with the actors in amongst us, so we were all on show, and thus all were the show.

This form gave the actors direct contact with the audience, creating an intimacy that allowed them to gently solicit our complicity. The rhythm of cleverly constructed interwoven monologues was peppered with the questions – “Is this OK?” “Shall I go on?” – and our collective consent pushed a journey of tiny steps into the dark place; a place which tested the boundaries of acceptability and, on arrival, implicated the audience as a moral and ethical committee.

It was an interesting theatrical experience and one which rested heavily on the actors’ shoulders; delivering taboo-challenging content in an intimate performance format.

Esther Smith was absolutely absorbing with a combination of intense physical energy and a lightness of touch that breathed fresh air on to fetid subject matter.

Chris Goode’s endearing nerdiness interjected pathos with a refreshing humanity, but where the play failed to meet its own challenge was in the very nature of theatrical taboo. Yes it’s horrible, yes it’s unacceptable, yes it’s shocking but it’s so self-knowing that we already dismiss is as creative fabrication.

We know it’s only theatre… or at least, we really hope it is.