Because You Never Asked is a clever, at times mesmerising performance by Montréal-based collective We All Fall Down. Conceived by Roger White and choreographer Helen Simard, the work draws on the recorded memories of White’s grandmother, Marianna Clark (née Goldmann), a Jewish teenager in 1930s Germany who eventually escaped to Edinburgh just before the start of WW2. It’s an emotionally charged blend of dance, music, and archived testimony, and its effect is quietly profound.
The cast comprises four dancers, three women and one man, whose presence is physically stunning and emotionally evocative. Émile de Vasconcelos-Taillefer and Maxine Segalowitz set the tone with intense, expressive sequences early on, while Lina Namts delivers a haunting spoken passage before folding seamlessly into movement. Their ability to embody memory and emotion is both beautiful and unsettling.
The choreography includes a striking motif: four raincoats early in the piece morph into elongated, Orwellian figures. These stylised, spy-like characters peer out at the audience, evoking a sense of surveillance and dread. Lighting design adds to the atmosphere, using sharp contrasts to transform the dancers into blurs of relentless energy, suggesting the speed and ruthless efficiency of the Nazi machine.
The narrative doesn’t shy away from moments of regret. At one point, Clark reflects on having missed the chance to shoot Hitler in Hamburg, fragile remorse mirrored in spiralling, hesitant movement. The fear and jeopardy of the time crystallise when her father is taken away while she is at school. It was only thanks to the intervention of the British embassy that he was eventually returned, delivered back by a local policeman who was himself in tears. That detail, of an officer weeping as he reunited father and daughter, always stayed with her. It underlines just how precarious survival was, and how even the smallest flickers of humanity could emerge amid brutality.
Though the outcome of the story is known, its retelling here feels urgent and fresh. The title’s meaning, “Because you never asked”, is revealed toward the end, and lands with quiet force. It becomes both a personal reflection and a call to the present, a reminder to ask, to listen, and to preserve stories before they fade.
Overall, Because You Never Asked presents a riveting, contemplative journey, thrilling in its restraint. Fast, furious choreography collides with moments of quiet testimony, while the fusion of sound, text, and dance gives memory a body. It’s a story worth hearing, a story worth telling, and it is beautifully danced
19:35 Daily (except 12th and 19th) Till 25th August
https://www.edfringe.com/tickets/whats-on/2025BECAUSF
Reviewer: Greg Holstead
Reviewed: 16th August 2025
North West End UK Rating:
Running time – 1hr