Two Sisters is a confrontation between a life imagined and a life lived, the possibilities of youth placed on a pedestal, making a mockery of middle age.
The production opens with a motley crew of young actors asking the audience to ponder their own 16-year-old summer. What were you wearing? Who did you love? How did you feel? Are all questions posed in a pre-show questionnaire, the answers of which are then incorporated into the script rendering it different in each performance, however common the denominators of questionable fashion and raging hormones are.
These are all questions pondered and reflected on by the two leads. Emma (Jess Hardwick) is a put together, married, lawyer searching for serenity and inspiration for her new novel. Her elder sister Amy, played by Shauna Macdonald, is everything she was at 16 – chaotic, aloof, and constantly moving on from love, just 30 years later. The formative summer of her childhood soon rears its nostalgic head in the form of ‘the one that got away’ Lance (Erik Olsson), who is still the DJ at the caravan park where the trio met so many years before.
Feelings are revisited and life choices are called into question as the ‘what ifs’ of life are banded around amid an ensemble of teens attempting to fumble their own way through love’s first heartbreaks.
David Greig’s new play dabbles with the seduction of nostalgia without getting overly sentimental. The script is funny and relevant with the core characters no wiser, or more discerning than the muddle of hormones in the ensemble. For theatre’s general demographic it is a whimsical stroll down memory lane to the chaos and craved independence of 16, and for those more youthful it is a reminder that life moves all too quickly, so make the most of it.
Image by Jess Shurte provided via Royal Lyceum Press Release