Petrol Jesus Nightmare #5 (In the Time of the Messiah) SKINNYFEST 1

Please be aware this play is set in a war zone', a sign outside the theatre warns. Perhaps the producers are afraid the audience has not watched enough evening news to sufficiently desensitise them to the hum of helicopters playing on a loop in the background; the choppers' thrum is pretty much the extent of the very sanitised war imagery. The three soldiers and their two guests are confined inside a shell-ravaged house, but the death and destruction of war are outside, out of sight, out of mind. If we must be warned about something, it should surely be the play's unrelenting and pitiless judgement on religion, corruption and greed, because the small amount of violence we see – shocking in its brevity and intensity – stems wholly from these issues, which inside the house feel oddly disconnected from the war raging in the streets. That it happens to be set in Israel and the warring factions are the Muslims and the Jews makes this particularly timely and that much more emotionally draining. Perhaps the sign should read, 'Please be aware this play will rob you of any hope'; a far more distressing thought in a world as damaged as this one.