There was a time when a troll was something associated with the Norwegian folk tale The Three Billy Goats Gruff. Now the word holds a different meaning, though no less ugly than the creature who lived under the ‘rickety rackety bridge’ waiting for a tasty goat to ‘trip trap’ over and be his lunch.
It’s the contemporary meaning of a troll, that creature of now who posts dangerous stuff on line while hiding behind the anonymity of an avatar or username, that gives the play its title yet goats manage to feature scarily in this disturbing new work from writer and performer Rob Crouch.
A woman tracks down a tech savvy loner who ‘hunts stupidity on line’. They set up a weird pact to let her "live beyond the system’s reach” for a year in the name of art and to assuage some blot on her past and in doing so set out on a mutually hazardous journey.
There’s a collision of real and virtual worlds as these intimate strangers play out a confusion between games and reality. Yet it can be no accident that they gradually come together sartorially over the piece, from matching grey T shirt to the full non-sports trackie bottoms.
There is impressive co-ordination of screen and stage action in this latest work from Rob Crouch that puts the creepy dangers of high personal surveillance and the tracking that is now part of everyday life under a spotlight. While we never really know who others really are, this play is a lesson on how technology further blurs the definitions
Trolling is a tautly directed and extremely well -acted salutary play for our times.
3 - 28 August 2016 (previews 3 - 5 August; no shows 10, 17, 24 August), 2.15pm age recommend 16+