EDINBURGH 2021: Review: COVID LOCKDOWN BREATH MACHINE, Summerhall Online

Covid Lockdown Breath Machine is a binaural listening experience that must be listened to through headphones. It transports you into the world of a coronavirus patient and you are advised to listen to it alone with the lights off and the curtains drawn.

This play is a lived experience of a young woman who has recently gone through a breakup and is now living alone in lockdown and developing symptoms of COVID-19. We hear the television broadcasting news from the Prime Minister reassuring us that we will soon be rid of this virus.

It begins with her needing her inhaler. It takes a while for her to admit that she is experiencing more symptoms. The breathing becomes more laboured through the headphones. The technology used for Covid Lockdown Breath Machine is almost too good. The sound effects are so realistic that at one point I did get up to answer my own front door.

Informed by director Tyrrell Jones' own experience of having Covid, this immerse audio play is frighteningly realistic. Lavinia Murray's script personalises the ordeal as the woman begins to hallucinate and spooky voices offer her the chance to exchange her sense of taste and smell for the ability to breathe again.

While I haven't been particularly enthusiastic about theatre relating to the pandemic I thought this was a particularly unique take on events. It questions 'what changes we could have made' while providing a captivating experience.

Covid Lockdown Breath Machine is available on demand from 6 August.

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