Eurohouse @ Summerhall

Bertrand Lesca and Nasi Voutas take to the stage with a truly infectious energy – instructing the audience to hold hands, in a move that makes people feel at ease and discomfited in equal measure.

What follows is an allegorical take on Greece’s mistreatment at the hands of the Eurozone. A bolshy Lesca plays an empowered and dictatorial France, while Voutas is an affable if taciturn Greece – beholden to the unwavering diktats stipulated by the gallus Gaul. 

There are some curiously thought-provoking images: bags of sweets stand in for monetary loans, while French chanson serves as a reminder of the EU’s strict bailout programme. Voutas’ dance of dissent makes for a poignant picture of the protests and riots that followed the relentless rounds of reforms, tax increases and spending cuts. 

When Voutas eventually concedes to Lesca’s unrelenting directives, we are reminded of Alexis Tsipras’s capitulation to the European Troika, and the ultimate futility of Greece’s fight. The banks will get what they are owed – whatever the toll on an ever-ailing Greece.  

Unfortunately, the thrust of the piece feels overworked. There is the singular image – one where the characters’ human behaviours reflect the absurdity of austerity and the debt crisis – but there is little else at play once this fact is realised. The two would do well to develop this idea further, for it achieves the feat of evoking vicarious emotion, as Voutas’ existence becomes further troubled at the hands of his taskmaster.       

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Eurohouse, Summerhall, until 26 Aug, 12pm, £10