Guest Reviewer: Daniel Shipman

Upstaged Rating: ⭐⭐⭐

Mental health is a tricky subject to write about in any context, let alone make theatre about. And yet, despite this difficulty, we all know that it is necessary to keep talking about it in order to dispel the myths and the stigma surrounding the topic.

With Burnout, emerging playwright Selina Helliwell does a great job of dealing with this problem. The play follows one night in a 24-hour gym as the members and the staff come to terms with the disappearance of Raf, a regular gym-goer. Whilst the reasons for his disappearance remain ambiguous, the strain exposes the problems and fears which the characters have been hiding. Despite this dark set-up, Burnout juggles humour and pathos to keep the audience entertained without straying from the central theme. This is helped by a well-paced script which never lingers too long on any character.

If anything, this does become a problem after a while. The play touches on the struggles faced by all seven characters, but a short running time of just over an hour meant that some relationships felt rushed. I wanted to spend more time getting to know the characters, and so the play would perhaps have benefitted from having a smaller cast.

The performances are strong, with Elise (Helliwell) and Daniel (Tom Sullivan) forming a solid core for the cast to work around. Whether talking to each other or directly to the audience through monologues, each performer expresses the worries of their character in a way that allows the audience to understand and identify with them.

Burnout is not without its problems, but it is a great example of how theatre can deal with challenging issues and still entertain.

-Daniel Shipman

Burnout runs at 3MT, Manchester until Saturday 25th August 2018.