Reviewed by Shona Jaunas

Back to Square One invites you into con­ver­sa­tion between 95 year old Inga’s liv­ing room in Den­mark and her grand­son, Anders Fal­stie-Jensen in New Zea­l­and.

It starts with the audi­ence all writ­ing their names on the stage front in chalk which imme­di­ately brings us into the space; we are all involved in this dis­cus­sion. Through the play Fal­stie-Jensen keeps bring­ing us into his con­ver­sa­tions with Inga and thoughts as he dis­cusses the mean­ing of liv­ing on this earth through Dan­ish folk stor­ies and inter­pret­a­tions of the multi-gen­er­a­tion­al response to the Cov­id lock­downs. He uses the stage and chalk as a visu­al rep­res­ent­a­tion keep­ing us on track as he meanders through what it means to feel isol­a­tion, be far away from fam­ily and deal with fear.

This is a non-pre­ten­tious moment of truth. Fal­stie-Jensen presents this story as a shared exper­i­ence and invites us to even­tu­ally ques­tion wheth­er going “Back to Square One?” is the next step in our jour­ney or wheth­er there is anoth­er option. Per­haps we could be bet­ter?

If you are look­ing for an epi­phany, then this is not the play for you but if you would like to par­take in a shared exper­i­ence that may reflect and extend your ideas of how the lock­downs affected you and the world that fol­lows then this is a warm and gen­er­ous invit­a­tion into one family’s exper­i­ence.  Fal­stie-Jensen is relaxed in his story telling style and his genu­ine pos­it­ive atti­tude is infec­tious.

The cake is really, really good, appar­ently a very dif­fi­cult to make Dan­ish dan­ish.  The chance to talk and have cof­fee togeth­er after the show only adds to its sense of tak­ing us all on a jour­ney togeth­er.

I went on a Sunday after­noon and it was a per­fect way to reflect on not only Fal­stie-Jensen and Inga’s con­ver­sa­tions but that yes, we have just all been through a glob­al pan­dem­ic togeth­er and maybe we should ree­valu­ate the world we live in.

Circa Two – Sat 3rd – Sun 11th Septem­ber, Tues – Sat 7.30pm; Sun 4.30pm

$25 – $35 (and $50 combo tick­et avail­able for 2 Tahi Fest­iv­al shows at Circa)
Get your tick­ets here.