Review: THIS MIGHT BE IT, Theatre N16

Vantage Point Theatre introduce their debut show, saying, "This is our play about loneliness". But neither of those nouns prove to be completely felicitous given the production that follows: it's more a series of scenes than a play, and more about social anxiety than loneliness. But it still works, so (as the young people say) whatever.

We begin with a couple staring at a TV screen, until she... well, no spoilers but there's a lovely pay-off in the final scene of this short (under one hour) show, which the pair open and close. It's nice to see them come again, stage centre, (as it were).

We then meet a range of characters, all failing to connect in a world packed with the means (if not the emotional intelligence) to do so. There's the couple torn apart by his depression; the academic who can't quite match up to her research when real life butts in, all messy and awkward; the guy too nervous to ask out his shop assistant paramour on a date; a foreign worker mopping up and treated like a skivvy, but longing to play the piano like the concert pianist he is; and, most interestingly, the robotic online assistant learning to be human from a guy barely able to articulate his own emotional life.

Of course, loneliness is a curse of 21st century life and This Might Be It skims over its surface like a stone over a deep still lake, illustrating rather than analysing its many forms. The ensemble piece opens up a conversation, particularly among young people, whom one might believe immune to loneliness's debilitating impact with their rich online lives and command of social media platforms - but, of course, it's not quite like that. There's a few laughs along the way too, so it's not all grim worthy social comment by any means.

The play does feel a little like a work-in-progress rather than a fully realised piece and the company ask for suggestions at the end of the show in acknowledgement of that. Mine is to read Philip K Dick's masterpiece of a short story, detailing what it is to feel empathy and to reach out to people, indeed ultimately what makes us human, as its title boldly announces - Human Is.

This Might Be It continues at Theatre N16 until 8 December.

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