Elsa has an octopus inside her head, she tells us, at the start of this sweet, affecting play about one woman’s experience of autism, from schoolyard bullying and ostracism to uncaring therapists, romantic rejections and contending with an often uncomprehending adult world.
Inspired by writer Allison Davies’s own diagnosis of autism and directed by Karen Traynor, the story explores that experience from the inside. We learn that Elsa has comfort words as a child (“onions”), a great mind for detail, but that she also struggles with acutely difficult moments (when she feels the octopus stirring dangerously) and embarrassments at school (“I love your earlobes” she tells a girl, on whom she has a crush, who shows only contempt back, sneering “What even are you?”).
