Breakfast plays at the Traverse this year feature six international writers who were commissioned to write a play responding to the word ‘tomorrow.’ This morning’s play, No Desert Roses, was written by the Egyptian writer Laila Solleman. With no staging, the scripts are read by the actors, either standing or seated on chairs.
No Desert Roses involved four actors – Blythe Duff, Sharon Duncan- Brewster, Anita Vettesse and Emily Wachter. They all read their parts with great conviction but the script itself was disjointed. There was virtually no dialogue between the actors, no common theme, just a plethora of ideas with little continuity.
Sometimes that can work, but in this instance it felt as though little thought had been put into the script. Even the character, as narrator, at the end pronounced, “I’ve written more than forty pages and I’m [still] struggling with what I want to say.”
Show times: 9am till 30th August. Ticket Price: £14 including breakfast roll and tea or coffee