A chance encounter, a misguided saviour complex, a buried and repressed past. A yarn is spun by a Northern lad (Conor Lowson) in desperate need to tell his story to anyone who’ll listen. Propelled by a compulsion to aid an injured older man encountered outside his local ‘The Ship’, Lowson tells the tale of becoming embroiled in the life and woes of this newly befriended kindred soul with keen precision, yet liberating ease.

Stripped-back from its previous iteration at the Arcola, Luke Stapleton’s Scab now theatrically oozes social commentary in the White Bear Theatre’s fittingly intimate and pubby space, even if it doesn’t yet quite know when to stop picking at the seams.

With nothing but a plain black folding chair and a bar-table sequestered to the rear of the space, it can only be a testament to Lowson’s ability to engage an audience that Scab’s 65-minute running time feels like little more than a long catch-up with an old friend.

Stapleton’s text, which flits between poetry and colloquialism, is overwhelmingly crafted into one voice with such a casual ease that his asides to the audience feel like welcome conversation, rather the perhaps familiar fringe-ism they risk being. From the outset, a level of trust falls about the space, as if a particularly loud punter has decided to share a life story after one-too-many, opening up to the room. Whether Lowson laments upon the sirens of a passing ambulance; mocks the price of the audience’s drinks; or jostles an audience member for dropping theirs, there is an effervescence to the way in which he deals with the live-ness of the theatre which feels exhilaratingly (and, perhaps sadly) rare.

As a piece, its minimalism is refreshingly its strength, and has clearly benefited from stripping back its ‘fringier’ conventions. Subtle shifts in lighting adjust the dramatic focus, intensity, and perspective without jarring as a commentary upon the material. It is a piece that feels delicately and diligently crafted, despite the brutalist nature of the text itself, both of which come as welcome contrasts to one another.

Despite being described ultimately as “a play about lost souls finding one another” by director Jamie Biddle, it is nonetheless a text with a deeply rich thematic, social, and cultural terrain for the audience to navigate. Through its various portrayals of an unnamed yet decaying, presumably post-industrial, Northern coastal town, Scab interrogates the forgotten corners of British society through its own poetic fringes, as even its title continues to conjure various insights throughout on the role of trauma, unsightliness, and healing in relation to social and cultural deprivation.

As these influences carve their mark upon the characters in Lowson’s narration, so too our expectation grows for a focus to emerge in the respect; ultimately this isn’t one that is quite fulfilled. The space for these big questions to breathe becomes a little exhausted by the frantic pace of the play’s concluding revelations, which expand rather than specify what is truly important about this story. This grasp for definite resolution and justification perhaps isn’t all so necessary after all: as Scab itself demonstrates, healing isn’t always pretty.

**** Four stars

Reviewed by: Kane Taylor

Scab plays at the White Bear Theatre until 30 April, with tickets available here.