The Flood - Reviews
THE STAGE ****
The Flood is a powerful metaphor for the insanity and human cost of war… A script built on the stammering fragments and repetitions of high passion contributes to the play’s power…. Steve Lambert and actress Susanne Gschwendtner movingly embody the emotional costs of war…
EDINBURGH FESTIVAL FRINGE
The Flood, by self-proclaimed creators of “extreme political art” Badac Theatre, is harrowing, but also deeply moving… The piece is an intimate two-hander performed in a small underground space for a standing audience… Actor and director Steve Lambert stars as the soldier. His lover is played brilliantly by Susanne Gschwendtner…
THE LIST ****
A nurse chops raw liver while a soldier obsessively counts the lice in his uniform. The tiny space smells harsh and metallic, of old bricks and blood… This is theatre in the recognisable Eastern European style, a chance for the strong of stomach to bear witness to the monstrosities of a war… A relentless 50 minutes and an unpleasant reminder that there are people in their own trenches to this day
BRITISH THEATRE GUIDE ****
The Flood is an intense, visceral theatrical experience… Susanne Gschwendtner is superb as the troubled nurse who has constant nightmares about death… There are some moments of tenderness as these two characters fall in love that only goes to make the violence even more unbearable to watch… This is compelling theatre that delivers a potent message
EDINBURGH SPOTLIGHT ****
Disturbing from the outset and with powerful use of repetition and simple props which evoke a butcher’s slab rather than a hospital ward, The Flood is unrelenting in its drive towards its inevitable end… The fact that the company are able to wring such raw emotion from so stark a set is testament to the strength of the script and of the performances, which pound with brutal directness one moment, then ache with heartbreaking tenderness the next… A bloody and unflinching protest against the futility of war, The Flood rises with an emotional surge which is hard not to be swept away by
BROADWAY BABY ****
The Flood provides a haunting, tragic insight into one of the most devastating events in modern history… The repitition, the discomfort of standing up, the sheer volume and relentlessness of the explosions and the piles of dead bodies all come together very effectively to simulate the trauma of the war… A brilliantly effective, novel way of depicting the terrors of the trenches, the Great War, and its far-reaching devastation.