While playwright Gabriel Jason Dean states that Rift contains autobiographical elements, his portrayal of two brothers – one an incarcerated racist, the other a liberal author – moves from its unpromising beginning in familial tension towards a more intriguing condemnation of liberal failure. With the ‘inside’ brother getting the best lines and personal journey, it exposes the contradiction between the outside brother’s egalitarian philosophy and his selfishness and shallowness.
The dramatic tension rests in the gap between their respective experiences and beliefs: what could have been an exercise in social tourism is transformed by the power imbalances between the brothers into an object lesson in how liberalism has failed to address the concerns of the marginalised. Without ever apologising for the prisoner’s horrendous racism, each scene exposes how the fine words of equality are, for the successful author, merely facades to disguise guile and self-absorption. It is an unforgiving portrayal of a man who knows the words but not the emotions or actions to create social change.
The ambivalent ending is a disappointing shrug in the face of the script’s engagement with both character and issues and while it retains a stark contrast between wrong and right, it challenges the good to do better.
Rift, Traverse Theatre, until 24 Aug (not 11, 18), various times