After Party
★★☆☆☆ No party
Traverse (Venue 15): Thurs 6 – Sun 30 Aug 2026
Review by Hugh Simpson
After Party at the Traverse has all of the ingredients for a statement drama but ends up rather undercooked.
A Traverse co-production with Paines Plough and the Belgrade, Coventry, Morna Young’s play deals with assisted dying and family trauma.
After Party by Morna Young. Pic: Marc Brenner
Dominant, not to say domineering, matriarch and celebrated actor Vivienne Blackwood summons family members to her sprawling pile for her 80th birthday party. But instead of the expected gathering of celebrities, it’s just the oddly-sorted, dysfunctional kinsfolk in attendance, who are told they’re there because Viv is going to die. Tomorrow.
There is much to admire in the writing, as it skips around weighty topics with wit, allusion and emotion. There is a great deal of potential in the situation, and a powerful cast.
However, it never really comes off. Although presumably set in a near future where assisted dying has been legalised, the setting seems stiff and old-fashioned, the dialogue a touch portentous and the characters less than compelling.
obvious drawback
There is an obvious drawback to presenting damaged, closed-off characters who don’t know how to communicate with each other, and the play never quite overcomes this. Awkward moments of infodump proliferate, and some of the participants are too much like caricatures.
Alison Peebles embodies both the spite and the fear of Viv, while Benny Young’s off-centre charm as her estranged husband Bill is very convincing. However, their children are underdeveloped. Hilary Maclean, as God-bothering Lily, and Gilly Gilchrist, as self-centred capitalist lothario Geoff, both put in sterling performances, but the whole family dynamic never convinces.
After Party by Morna Young Pic: Marc Brenner
Grandson James (Alex Yellowlees), meanwhile, is an emotional wreck for reasons not fully explored, and his partner Cass (Ruby Glyne) is a singer who seems to have come from another play altogether. Once again, the performers do their best, but the relationship never rings true.
Rachel Dick’s wise-fool influencer Sasha is a more interesting (if hardly more fathomable) character, while Maryam Hamidi’s doctor is given little to do.
moral centre
In many ways the production’s moral centre is Liz Kettle’s Liz, Geoff’s ex-wife who became Viv’s carer. Kettle is tremendous, and the scenes between Liz and Viv have the depth and emotional pull missing elsewhere.
Katie Posner’s direction strives hard to inject pace into a play that is just too long for its own good, with the awkward running time (just over two hours including an interval) doing it few favours. Richard Kent’s rather fussy set epitomises a play that is trying hard to impress, but little of it really comes off as it threatens to.
Running time: Two hours and 5 minutes (including a short interval).
Traverse (Traverse 1), 10 Cambridge St, EH1 2ED (Venue 15).
Thursday 6 – Sunday 30 August 2026.
Tue – Sun: See website for details.
Tickets and details: Book here at EdFringe.com.
Tickets direct from venue: Book here.
Traverse website: www.traverse.co.uk/
Facebook: @TraverseTheatre
Instagram: @traversetheatre
Linktree: @traversetheatre.
After Party by Morna Young. Pic: Marc Brenner
ENDS
