Review: The Fifth Step

Presented by Edinburgh International Festival and the National Theatre of Scotland, The Fifth Step is a weird play, but then it deals with the experiences of men who are going through a very weird and disorientating process. Luka (Jack Lowden) is embarking on the Twelve Steps alcohol recovery programme and James (Sean Gilder) is the middle-aged sponsor whom he’s chosen to guide him through the process.

Impressionable, guileless and adrift on the hallucinatory tide of a life with no alcohol where once it was full of it, Luka seeks solace in porn, Jesus and marathon sex with an older married woman he’s met at church. Meanwhile the assured James, Luka’s one true anchor in life, is slowly revealed to be mired in doubt, hypocrisy and disturbing imperfections of his own. Are their abusive fathers to blame, or do they command their own destiny?

It’s also a weird play because it was written by David Ireland, and while Finn den Hertog’s direction is to a much more measured pace than that seen in Ireland’s Ulster American (arguably the greatest Fringe play since Fleabag), the script still refuses to pursue comfort or predictability in virtually every scene. Milla Clarke’s striking, big-budget revolving set emphasises this, moving from waiting room to café to hospital bedside, breaking apart at the same rate as the characters onstage.

Amid the often very dark humour, it’s a play about masculinity, sexuality, choosing the wrong role models and learning to find peace in the world by first making it with yourself. Although whether either Luka or James ever manage this is debatable.