Adam Scott-Rowley’s latest Fringe sell-out creation, YOU ARE GOING TO DIE celebrated its press performance last night (22 April) at the Southwark Playhouse Borough to a jubilant and pulsating crowd. Indeed, despite its seemingly bleak title, YOU ARE GOING TO DIE appears to be a show that while confounding, nevertheless delights audiences. Although some of that communal delight is hard to empathise with.

Firstly, Adam Scott-Rowley is an arresting performer who demonstrates excellent talent walking a tightrope between clowning, theatre and performance art. Scott-Rowley has moments of majesty when his (naked) frame seems to move through the entirely of human experience. Scott-Rowley bounds from telling a tender story of a frail old lady who talks about being on the ‘precipice’ of death with a heart-warming monologue about her ‘pussy’ (cat) to physical clowning where Scott-Rowley seems to shed light on the expectation of masculinity recalling the frames of Greco-Roman statues.

Adam Scott-Rowley’s only co-star is the porcelain toilet, and this is where, if you’re not a fan of this peculiar brand of ‘toilet’ humour, the show can start to lose you. For example (spoilers ahead), one of Scott-Rowley’s character’s forms an attraction to the toilet seat with graphic consequences. There is more emphasis of dildos than you might think from a show entitled YOU ARE GOING TO DIE, but perhaps that juxtaposition and confusion is exactly what Scott-Rowley is aiming for.

Special praise must be extended to the lighting design by Matt Cater whose work truly compliments Scott-Rowley’s imaginative script. Characters react to each lighting change, and it is probably the most distinctively playful use of lighting design that most audiences will have seen whilst being devastating and dramatic at times. There is a standout sketch-like scene when Scott-Rowley seems to imitate being a teenager “stuck in a well” when being under a spotlight, which must be seen to be truly appreciated.

There are moments when Scott-Rowley captures your heart and yet leaves you with a feeling of unease, never being allowed to settle in with one character, always moving and changing, dying and being reborn.

YOU ARE GOING TO DIE is a show that really needs to be seen to be believed.

*** Three stars

Reviewed by: Nancy Brie

YOU ARE GOING TO DIE plays at Southwark Playhouse Borough until 4 May, with further info here.