A Mirror

Belvoir Str Theatre 21 February - 22 March 2026

The review - an afterthought, after the season

This is a multylayered unmerciful play with a complex, tight logical structure. Its scaffolding is cold and strong as it is assembled from steel beams.

It might be named antiutopian, yet it reminds and resonates with dissidents' literature from the Soviet Union times. Writers like Solzhenicyn, who spent years in prisons punished for political crimes, crimes against the State. Quite a reference to what is happening in some places again, now.

Even the stage setup, a space of a bureaucratic office dangerously close to basements where concrete walls seemed to smell like blood and still echo screams of those who vanished there.

An audience invited to participate in a wedding, twice warned to leave the assembly, and at the end thrown into an abyss of non-compliance together with four on the stage.

Posh and stylishly decorated space at first, with symbols of items rather than solid objects (like an empty light frame instead of a door), with long, symmetrically attached to the ceiling, soft, long, and wide fabric pieces. Those do fall off soon, leaving a square of a slightly elevated floor. It could look like a dance area, if not the weirdly disturbing mix of colours, dark rusty red and orangy brown. Colour which fits nicely with the rusty colour of the walls - anxious colour of dried blood.

It sounds heavy, and heavy it is. It would be unbearable if not a dense story itself, directed clearly and precisely, letting layer after layer be discovered exactly in the moment it was meant to.

It flows with energy, and at times it is funny (blood flow made out of red pens is priceless), at times it is tender.

A wedding is a cover for a play, performed unapproved. This play itself contains one more inside it, but at the end, it reveals one more layer.

A desk, modest chairs, and a door frame are picturing an office of the Head of a Ministry of Culture, somewhere in an unnamed city.

Mr Čelik (Yale Ozucelik), a bigwig bureaucrat at the Ministry of Culture, is eccentric and extremely hard to read. He is a fox with tens of facial expressions, with an excellent sense for literary talent, mutated, forced by the system, the talent of an entrepreneur and producer.

While hitting into something strong and fresh, but not compliant, he is wearing a mask of a protector, converting young blood to patriotic, state-serving citizens. Also, he is someone to dissect, to adjust, to distort the talent. Keep the power but redirect it.  

A young man was invited to Mr Čelik’s office for a chat about his new play. Adem (Faisal Hamza @faisal_hamza), a raw flow of energy, unleashed in his wish to talk about what he observes and records, having a photographic memory for what is happening and said around him. Adem’s urge to tell the truth needs to be harnessed. With the requested assistance of Mei (Rose Riley @sheiswitch_), Mr Čelik’s secretary, the process of refinement begins. Mei, a young woman who wears with confidence an extremely tight pencil skirt, buttoned-up jacket and heavy heels naturally (I can never imagine how one can even move in such an outfit), as a uniform. A closed book at first, shy to respond promptly and defined, as a soldier, this character unrolls into something mighty deep. Another tour de force, a made-to-be loyal writer Bax (Eden Falk), is invited to a cohort to reshape Adem. Eden Falk’s transitioning from a well-fed, polished, contained person to a depressed, furious, drunk man whom Adem unintentionally pushed to see how far he lost his uniqueness, sparing his big talent on a censors-approved BS, is commendable. A real talent, realising the depth of the betrayal of his own gift is a dangerous beast - and it played wonderfully.

These three have another connection - they are all ex-army. Even living a civil life, their bodies still have triggers to respond to automatically. The similar past is something that brings them closer, connecting them more, as humans, over shared memories and nightmares.

This work is confining, it is scary because the walls, stairs with covered pictures outside, when everything is made to isolate. And it felt very, very real. The density of horrors in the outside world is high; inside the theatre, for those nights, it has been condensed even more.

Creative team

Writer Sam Holcroft

Director Margaret Thanos @margaret.thanos

Set & Costume Designer Angelina Daniel @angelinadanieldesign

Lighting Designer Phoebe Pilcher @pjpilcher

Composer and Sound Designer Deniel Herten @stophertendaniel

Military Consultant Jake Speer @jakespeer_

Fight Director Diego Retamales @commadiego

Intimacy Director Chloë Dallimore

Vocal Coach Felicity Jurd @felicityjurdofficial

Stage Manager Jen Jackson

Assistant Stage Manager Estelle Gomersall

Cast

Faisal Hamza @faisal_hamza, Rose Riley @sheiswitch_, Eden Falk, Yale Ozucelik