Long Cloud Youth The­atre Sum­mer School have worked with A Slight­ly Iso­lat­ed Dog to inves­ti­gate then recre­ate a night out. The show is fre­net­ic with lots of short scenes from a typ­i­cal night out. There’s a lot of drink­ing, some danc­ing. There are some ongo­ing sto­ries but most of the action and inter­est is in recog­nis­ing the sce­nar­ios being played. Almost every­thing that I’ve seen hap­pen dur­ing a night out (or a night in at some­one else’s place) is shown. The actors get to show off their musi­cal skills as well with some singing and oth­ers play­ing instru­ments.

It has one of the most mag­i­cal sets I’ve seen. Designed by Oliv­er Morse, it fea­tures beer box­es, beer bot­tles, crates, old couch­es, and old TVs. Light­ing for the action is some­times pro­vid­ed only by the desk lamps that are scat­tered around the stage (light­ing design by Jason Longstaff.) The TVs are used to show some of the inter­view ques­tions the actors used in their research. (Sound and AV by Matt Eller.) Micro­phones ampli­fy con­ver­sa­tions and direct atten­tion to where the action is. The per­for­mance area is all over the place. On the stage, up on the steps where the seats are, in the bar, out­side the the­atre. The audi­ence is seat­ed around the edges of the space. (I think the best place to sit would be up on stage. Wher­ev­er you sit you’ll prob­a­bly miss see­ing some of the action.)

I liked it. It felt like a night out should — every scream­ing, singing, danc­ing, swear­ing, shout­ing, melan­cholic sec­ond of it. It’s loud and a bit inco­her­ent. (What was par­tic­u­lar­ly inter­est­ing for me was what the work did not do and that was judge the actions of the char­ac­ters. Instead it was a reflec­tion of what hap­pens. It made me con­sid­er my own response to things that hap­pen and the actions of oth­er peo­ple. Walk­ing down the street after the show had nev­er felt so per­for­ma­tive before.) Nice work.