What’s On – Morag and Keats review

Morag and Keats: A Play Noir is every bit as enjoyably silly as its subtitle would suggest. Full of witty one-liners, a ridiculous but suspenseful plot and some wonderful acting, it is one of the most exciting things at the Edinburgh fringe this summer.

We are in New York City, 1948, and a crime has taken place; Detective Keats’s partner Dixon has been murdered, and all that’s left at the scene is a pot of guacamole. Cue an hour of rollicking good fun. The characters are all brilliant riffs on pulp fiction clichés – a central casting dangerous dame, a hapless Edward Scissorhands-esque waiter, a sexually deviant chief of police.

Alice Kirk shines as Morag – ‘ the kinda dame that could make a priest assault a nun.’ She is all red lipstick and spidery eyelashes casting shadows onto her cheeks. Her voice is the perfect quavering bad-ass as we try to figure out whether she is innocent bystander or femme fatale. Misha Patel gives a star turn as Gill, a waiter who may or may not hold the clue to the crime. He’s shaky and hollow-cheeked, with the flickering eyes of a junkie and the bearing of Lurch from the Adams Family. Meanwhile Ed Philips and Jacob Fredrickson make a comically brilliant double-act as Detective Keats and the Chief respectively. Bryher Flanders’ directing showcases their comic timing and bounding energy spectacularly.

But the brilliant young cast would be nothing without the dialogue. Written by Will Farrell (no, not that one) and Milo Gough, Morag and Keats is full of wit and verve. The language is a labour of loving period pastiche – everyone is a ‘dame’ or a ‘cat’ – and the one-liners are fast-flowing and delivered with panache. ‘I gotta piss so bad my eyeballs are floating,’ says Keats at one point. ‘I tried to live my life according to the good book. I even murdered a homosexual,’ he explains at another.

The plot is pacy and ludicrously good fun. Taking extensive notes from the film noir genre, and then forcing them through a prism of undergraduate irreverence, there is as much farce as there is tension. ‘The evidence makes complete and perfect sense,’ exclaims the Chief at a moment when the plot has swerved so wildly it’s almost hard to keep up. Sure, it’s preposterous – but it’s all so charmingly ebullient that one hardly notices the giddy spiraling and outlandish twists. All in all: a joyous production, with enough suavity to keep the light-hearted jubilation in check.

Morag and Keats runs until 26th August. To buy tickets visit edfringe.com