In one of the smallest theatres in London, a play whose main characters do not budge from their chairs slowly unfurls. You might think (at least if you have never heard of Samuel Beckett) that Something in the Air would have limited scope. But as Peter Gill’s drama spools back and forward in time it conjures a neglected world, touches rare emotions, gains in consequence.
Finding gravity in small scenes is one of Gill’s talents. For almost 60 years he has brought to his explorations of love between men, and his patient examination of non-grand lives, an unusual combination of qualities: sophistication and simplicity, stillness and passion, a disregard for dogged literalness and a meticulous documentary detail. Directing his own work (here in collaboration with Alice Hamilton), he sets up dance-like patterns between actors and seems to choreograph silences.
