Arctic Oil @ Traverse Theatre

Arctic Oil, a new play by Clare Duffy, commissioned by the Traverse Theatre and the IASH, University of Edinburgh, has its stage premier in this punchy production, directed by Traverse Associate Director Gareth Nicholls (Ulster American).

Set in a single location of a bathroom, in a house on a remote Scottish island, and with just two characters on stage, the 65-minute single-act play has a claustrophobic air as mother (Jennifer Black) and daughter (Neshla Caplan) trade vocal blows in a power struggle ping-pong match. Maternal survival instincts kick the two characters in polar moral directions.

The mother believes her daughter’s environmental activism is too dangerous, that she should let things be, muttering, “We’re dirty, we’re messy, we die, that’s life,” and will do anything to prevent her taking part, including locking them both in the bathroom all night. Meanwhile daughter Ella thinks that the only way to secure a future for her baby and generations to come is to fight man’s never-ending pollution of the land and greedy quest to pillage oil at all costs. And it’s Ella’s description of the purity and beauty of the arctic, contrasting sharply with her speech about the pungent aroma of the “fat of the land” which greets you as you return to the mainland, that is particularly poignant and arresting.

Both Black and Caplan command the stage, embodying the compelling battle of two strong wills convincingly with their sharp tongues, and Fight Director Raymond Short’s physical grapples are convincingly constructed. These tussles threaten to spill over the edges of the compact stage as mother and daughter collide. Underneath the torrent which battles on, there are also moments of loss, of love, and of loneliness, with a noticeable shift in pace towards the end of the play following a dramatic twist. After a crescendo of door kicking, shoving, key-swallowing and shouting and swearing, the final segment’s slower pace feels a little flat.

Arctic Oil is a claustrophobic, engaging play where maternal instincts collide, which considers how the moral compass of the individual impacts the environmental degradation of the planet.