Elf Lyons is The Woman on the Edge – Pleasance Courtyard
Elf Lyons is The Woman on the Edge arrived with considerable expectation, and for a while I thought I was in for something rather special.
The opening Hitchcock-esque passages are beautifully conceived, Lyons creating something strange, textured and nuanced, with an unsettling film-noir quality that suggested an intriguing hour ahead. Unfortunately, for me, the show gradually lost its way.
The Beyond at Pleasance Courtyard doesn't necessarily help. It is a particularly wide room, requiring Lyons to cover considerable ground to maintain contact with the whole audience. She certainly works hard physically, but looking around during some of the longer passages, I saw rather a lot of people not laughing. Instead, there were quizzical faces, apparently trying, as I was, to piece ...