Playing with Fire, NT Olivier, London
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Your support makes all the difference.She pushes for the speedy promotion of an Asian councillor, Paul Bhattacharjee's Riaz, making a dangerous enemy en route of the wily, long-standing official, Oliver Ford Davies's Frank, who is unceremoniously ousted and then discovers Alex and Riaz are having an affair. Alex also pressurises the council's initially scornful Old Labour leader, David Troughton's George. So he toes the line and starts the town's regeneration programme by finding funding - at the expense of other projects - to match the grant for which the Asian district is eligible.
This play is certainly timely and probes an important and sensitive contemporary issue, clearly being based on many news stories and investigations into Britain's riven multicultural conurbations. After Wyverley is engulfed by riots - like Oldham, Bradford and Burnley in 2001 - the shocked politicians and community leaders try to analyse the root causes, both conferring privately and giving evidence to a government inquiry, courtroom-style.
Meanwhile, we glean the neo-fascist Britannia party is gaining ground and an Asian youth, who seemed happily assimilated before, has reverted to traditional Muslim dress and become militantly angry - with a hint, perhaps, of the future terrorist about him.
The trouble is that Playing With Fire hardly sparks into life at all. Edgar has obviously done his research with thoroughness but hasn't successfully digested and transformed all his material into an engaging drama. Suffering by comparison with David Hare's Labour Party play, The Absence Of War, this is a peculiarly arid, grey and sprawling piece with too many wooden exchanges and repetitive sections that patently need redrafting. Presumably, the snappy delivery of lines is meant to create an atmosphere of thrusting urgency, but this trick rapidly becomes tiresome. Regrettably, Edgar's zigzagging - back and forth in time and between narration and dialogue - also feels more mannered than exciting.
The play's far-reaching political point does come into focus towards the end and there are some fine performances in Michael Attenborough's production, notably Troughton's bullish but increasingly conscience-stricken George and Trevor Cooper as his hilariously bluff and sarcastic Old Labour chum, Arthur - the comic relief. However, Fielding's pushy Alex is intensely irritating, vocally monotonous and self-consciously arch, and most of the evening is a dreadful slog. Oh, and did I mention the visually dull settings: bland conference tables and street scenes played out against a drab clutter of road signs, lampposts and billboards. The National Theatre off-colour.
To 22 October, 020 7452 3000
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