Michael is a father to a runaway girl. Lillian is a prostitute and the object of Dave's affection.  Rachel, the missing daughter turns tricks with Lillian to get by and when Dave is shunned by Lillian, he rapes Rachel as revenge.

The preview for The Heart is Nicotine promises a visually and physically exciting production that will be 'more challenging than most pieces of new writing you will see at the fringe this year'.  In truth, the script does deal with the difficult subjects of prostitution, rape and domestic violence though none of these issues gets enough attention to really make the points that the writer is trying to get across.  Instead, the script seems to be trying to be too worthy and political and could have been refined to deal with one subject more thoroughly.

The writing style also varies from at times beautifully naturalistic to overly wordy which in turn leaves the cast struggling to deliver the sporadically unnatural language. 

The cast themselves are fairly talented performers though the material or direction doesn’t give them much opportunity to shine taking what could be beautifully controlled moments of despair and turning them into inaudible screaming matches.

The multimedia elements of the production dominate any moments of high drama and although they give a sense of an inspired moment in the development of the show, you can’t help feel that the standard of filming and projection in the space lessens the productions quality instead of enhancing it.

Sweet Grassmarket
Aug 3-13: 15:45 (50mins) £7:00 (£6:00)