Following its acclaimed world premiere at Off-Broadway’s Signature Theatre, multi-award-winning director Gary Abrahams (Iphigenia In Splott, Red Stitch; Yentl, Arts

The play centres on a group of five friends who gather on the night of their 20th high school reunion. In what begins as a night of nostalgia, revelry soon gives way to revelation as friendships are tested, bonds are strained and the spectre of mortality looms at the edge of the party. With unflinching insight,  The Comeuppance offers a powerful reflection on society today and the inevitability of time.

As I entered the beautiful Red Stitch Theatre space, I was immersed in the incredibly detailed and intricate set (designed by Ella Butler) of a veranda and yard of a house complete with fully grown trees, grass and leaves spread all over.  

Having not knowing much about the show before seeing it, I didn’t know what to expect.  What I got was a hilarious, gut-wrenching and heartwarming story all in one, plus a dark subplot which added a surprising touch to the entire play.  The show was very skilfully directed by Gary Abrahams, making sure every cast member had their moment to shine and tell their individual stories.

To the cast, as the audience walks in the character of Emilio (played by Khisraw Jones-Shukoor) is on the stage playing around to give the authenticity of being at home.  Jones-Shukoor’s performance is powerful and at times confronting as his character starts off happy and playful but spirals out of control by the end.  I found his performance highly believable.  

As the vision impaired friend who lives in the house, Ursula, AYA’s performance is astonishing from start to finish and covers all grounds from comedy to highly dramatic, one particular sound I thought they stood out in was the final scene everything started to unravel and Ursula was reminiscing.  This scene was acted with a huge amount of precision.  

As Caitlyn, Julia Grace’s role requires a lot of emotion, physically and mentally and she handles it with a high level of skill.  

Towards the end of Act 1 we meet Kristina and Francesco, played by Tess Masters and Kevin Hofbauer.  Hofbauer put in probably my favourite performance of the cast, as his character was often always larger the life with a big personality.  I thoroughly enjoyed what he brought to the role, Tess Masters also put in a super strong performance.  The vocal exchanges between Kristina and Francesco were intense and played out very well, a particular acting highlight came when Francesco had a seizure.  This was a very powerful scene and full of high emotion felt by the audience and the cast.    

Finally as Simon, the FaceTime caller,  Douglas Lyons played the uncertain character with gusto in what would have been an interesting role to interpret being only being in a phone call.

My favourite part of the whole show was when each character broke the fourth wall and talked about their dark secrets to the audience as if they were someone else other than their character.  This was often used with creepy voice effects on a hand held microphone to create a dark element to the already highly action packed story line.