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Director    Martin Danziger   
Assistant Directors    Carrie Cracknell & Becky Pullin
Designer    Ailsa Rendell
Company    RSAMD
Venue    Tron Theatre

Scottish premiere of Martin Crimp's piece which turns our definition of a 'play' on its head, presenting a series of darkly comic, irony laden scenarios in which the identity of the mystery woman is repeatedly imagined, discussed, dissected and possibly dismissed. With spectacular theatrical innovation, Crimp's play deconstructs identity and modern living.

Reviews

If suicide is so painless the why does the post-mortem last a lifetime? In Martin Crimp's fascinating and beguiling exercise, dying is an art for the unseen Anne, but, boy, does she do it exceptionally well. These 17 Scenarios For The Theatre make up a weirdly seductive little oddity. With no plot to speak of, and no characters save for the unseen, multi-faceted Anne, it's left to the imaginations of the performers to construct a whole. 
Director Martin Danziger and the eight strong cast grab what could easily be a rotting corpse to create what is a dramatic autopsy, which finds a million muck rakers determined to impose their definition on a deconstructed half-understood life. Out of such slim pickings  springs an untouchable ideal full of tragedy, mystery and a yet to be resolved truth.
Was Anne an X-rated poster girl who only wanted to  travel the world and meet people in a life fast, die young, beautiful corpse scenario? Or was she on the run from herself as much as the third party of her past?
As is often the case, hers is a contemporary English masterpiece, which no other company in Scotland has yet developed enough balls to produce. Yet in the hands of Danziger and his bright, brave and vivacious cast, a daringly forensic dissection of dramatic possibility begins with us left in the dark as much as those on stage.. Things maybe brighter by the end, but there's not much more light shed in this tantalising tease of a play.
        The Herald

Subtitled '17 scenarios for the theatre', the play is completely unconventional in form, a series of voices meditating on and fantasising about the life of a woman called Anne, an aid worker or holiday rep, ethnic cleansing victim, conceptual artist, international terrorist, or trans-European whore, who may or may not ever have existed.
Martin Danziger's eight strong company make a fine intense job of leading the audience through the bleak shifting landscape of Crimp's text, which comes across like an explosive snapshot of British liberalism and European consciousness. The production is given a strong contemporary twist as the audience are swept along by the passion and precision of the acting.
        The Scotsman

Tackling any play is a challenge and Martin Crimp has put almost everything up for grabs in this play subtitled, '17 scenarios for the theatre'. Each scenario has a title like, 'Untitled (100 words)', 'Kinda Funny' or 'The Girl Next Door'. There are no characters delineated in the script. The only indication that a new character is speaking is a dash before the new line. It's not a blank canvas but the clues offer many approaches unlike the rigid and often stale slice of life we are served in some plays.
Director Martin Danziger and his cast have done all lot more than attempt to bring this piece to life. Changing characters discuss an Anna, or maybe she's called Anya or Anny. At first you and the actors are both in the dark then scene by scene the physical illumination changes - one candle, a few, torches, desk lamps and lights, all ones you might have at home. Like the effective changing lighting and their sources, the central character shifts and changes in the scenarios. Always female, sometimes you think she maybe a child, a lost friend, a film star, (or is she being portrayed by one?), a child killer, a masochist. Or is she all of these? Nothing you feel is impossible, as we see an art gallery where art goers become statues while the statues become art goers. Crimp's script shifts and turns our perceptions uneasily reminding us that we never know anyone really, not all of them.
Alisa Rendell's design with a low multi-rostra stage under which fragments of possible lives threaten to spill out, seats the audience in four clumps around it's plus sign shape. It's the most successful use of the Changing Room space I have seen. It could be tricky to keep the audience engaged with 'Attempts On Her Life' with its constant changes of places and possibilities. These finely tuned, memorable actors, Rendell's cunning design and Danziger's just as cunning direction ensure you leave more stimulated than satisfied, lines of Crimp's atmospheric ambiguous script running in your head.
    Edinburgh Guide

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