Shackled

It feels as though writer Fergus Ford might be a bit of a movie buff.

His latest play, in which two young men who have never met wake to find themselves chained together, has echoes of such recent shockers as Saw and Hard Candy.

It also shares with those eye-watering offerings some pretty extreme violence, which worringly appears to not be entirely simulated.

Lad-about-town Stu is fresh out of college. Alex is in town visiting his mum. Both claim they have no memory of the night before, but one of them is lying. Apparently the play is 'based loosely on real events' but as the truth is revealed, the explanation that emerges is underwhelming.

The aggrieved young man's vengeful fury feels spectacularly misdirected, and he fails to provide adequate responses to the protests of his adversary.

The play's early dialogue has a natural rhythm and the opening is well structured, with Brian Hook as Stu and Phillip Dunning as Alex giving competent performances. However, things soon descend into one-note hysteria, and the power struggle between the two is entirely unconvincing.

The less said about the ending the better.