Albatross Review – Antarctic explorer gets winter welcome home | Theater

Mein these days of ever-increasing climate crisis, we need scientists to be the heroes. Alice, the glaciologist has just arrived Antarcticathey know that. After all, he also wants: “To find a solution. Start something. Find something out. Hit the switch and end it all.”

Playwright Martha Loader, who won the George Devine award last year for The Town, has spent two years interviewing Antarctic explorers not only about their work, but how it has affected their lives. In Albatross, the house Alice returns to is where Eve’s mother has been caring for her five-year-old daughter. And their midnight encounter – made more difficult by the presence of Eve’s new boyfriend, Martin – allows Loader to explore the moral dilemmas that each generation owes to the next, and whether the good outweighs human responsibility, even motherhood.

At the heart of the Menagerie Theater The company’s production is a romantic performance by Agnes Lillis as Eva, a woman who has spent her adult life caring for others and wants, now, to enjoy her trip to see penguins. We feel her frustration as she struggles to reconnect with Alice who was with Caroline Rippin (“like hugging a tennis racket”, says Eve). There is also sadness, as Loader portrays Eve’s obsession with the negative, longing thoughts that distance most of us from impending danger. In fact, it is easier to argue that “Sahara can be like Portugal” than to face the terrible reality.

But as Alice insists, the truth has already arrived – and this is evident in Chris Dobrowolski’s recently flooded kitchen, where the furniture is placed on small pieces of white linoleum that look like ice. Director Patrick Morris (who also plays Martin) suggests that more shelves are being smashed here, although this doesn’t feel like the show is moving too fast.

However, there is much more to enjoy, including the description of hot ice served through an ice cream cone. And seeing this build at UEA – where its school has one of the UK’s leading climate science departments – underlined their bravery for all of us.