Teenage runaways Dakota and Bebe fancy themselves the treasured outlaw heroes of their favourite films. Thelma and Louise. Pumpkin and Honey Bunny from Pulp Fiction. Musically, Kurt Cobain soundtracks their desperate lives, a patron saint of alienation and trauma. Over the course of 90 minutes, writer Simon Jaggers follows their efforts to establish a visionary new existence outside conventional parameters. It may seem a folly of an endeavour, doomed to failure, but Jaggers very much admires and respects the attempt.

They have come, on the lam, to reside in the sweep of an abandoned quarry after having stolen a sum of money from a chicken shop, determined to live off grid. Responsibly utilising their spoils, they seem to have bought the proper materials by which to withstand their new environment. Jaggers doesn’t seem very interested in investigating the moment-to moment practicalities of the new arrangement, instead taking the approach of romantic license. 

Having mostly mapped the contours of each surrounding direction, it is only one area that remains undefinable, an expanse from which any manner of folkloric, mythic or primal disquiet emanates. Bebe is more sensitive and undone by this unknown. He erects a makeshift alarm system in hopes of staving off any assault. Reddit has supplied him with a list of survivalist requirements. 

They spend their unregulated hours engaged in trust exercises, telling ghost stories, staging impromptu chat shows, smoking weed, leaping off cliffs, admiring the stars and, in one particularly intimate exchange, bequeathing a portion of each other’s souls to one another. Boredom and fatigue lead to arguments and sniping. Fears are mutually assuaged with comforting gestures. At one point, the audience is drawn into their gamesmanship, a somewhat discordant and bewildering break from the play’s interiority. But it is the titular game that is the most prominent feature of their daily exchange, an action which insists on a swift response of honesty to a sudden question. This is the idyllic burn of youth, demanding an eternal faithfulness and trust. A pure connection, free of guile or deceit. 

Shakira Riddell-Morales and Abdul Jalloh bring enormous spark and energy to their roles, a real sympathy for their character’s respective predicaments, and a sweet if tentative acknowledgement of growing attraction. Morales finds several shades of excitability in Dakota, hinting at the wounded soul buried beneath a blithe exterior. She, more than her friend, is habituated to the nomadic spirit. Jalloh, with deft skill, suggests Bebe’s growing exhaustion and impatience with their situation, realising that he has reasons to return to his previous life. He mentions several times his desire for the simple pleasure of a McDonald’s meal. His need to see his ailing sister. He has kept, surreptitiously, an item meant to be disposed. The audience realises that he has good-naturedly followed Dakota into the wilds out of a sense of companionship and care.  

Both actors are let down in unfortunate ways by the acoustic liabilities of the space. Although the catwalk style of staging works in terms of immediacy, much of the dialogue is drowned out at the fringes and when the actors are sat on the floor, as they are often, with focus downwards. The physical strain to see and hear was palpable from the audience. Unlike many productions at the Vaults, the sound of the trains above moving in and out of Waterloo station are disruptive here. 

The length of the production also works against, at times, the emotional potency of the piece. One too many scenes feel like they are regurgitating points already made and behaviours seen, blunting narrative propulsion. Jaggers errs on the side of slight besotted excess, studying the central couple from every possible angle. His love for their pluck is undoubtedly strong. The poignant culminating flash-forward rights the wandering material, a back-and-forth delivery which suggests the ways in which certain formative experiences embed themselves profoundly -and unconsciously- in the psyche. Dakota and Bebe really have imprinted themselves on each other’s soul after all.

{🎟 AD – PR invite – Tickets were gifted in exchange for an honest review}

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