A Conversation With My Father[author-post-rating] (3/5 Stars)

Kettling, forward intelligence teams and giant woollen onesies, just some of the amusing and distressing topics in Hannah Nicklin’s new one woman show, A Conversation With My Father. Three carefully angled cameras dramatically failed to record during this singular conversation between her ex-policeman father and Nicklin, his protestor daughter. The one surviving record is a small dictaphone, which at the time was set on the corner of the interview table. Throughout the performance the static-y crackled voice of Hannah’s father intermittently echoes warmly around the space. There’s a calm, collected emotion to all his answers, he remains as present onstage as his daughter.

It’s not uncommon for the fringe to occasionally undergo a substantial influx of nostalgia porn – sets of autobiographical claptrap that act as a theatrical therapy session for the performer. Our host sidesteps this wistful landmine in favour of a piece that is understatedly intimate and rarely saccharine. There’s an implicit invitation into Nicklin and her father’s conversation. To pull up a chair at the table and join the well-mannered debate to which there are few simple answers.

From protestors’-eye views of dangerous marches to crayoned descriptions of police riot uniforms, the tone oscillates at an absorbing frequency. Despite the compelling content the production occasionally wavers on the edge of family photo album territory. Both the performer’s feet and ours are firmly under the table by now and it’s difficult to step back without knocking over the chairs and upsetting the tea and biscuits. It’s a challenging task for a performer to take a cold theatrical perspective on such a personal topic. Subsequently certain subjects are given too much prevalence and the form begins to ramble somewhat as Nicklin drops into storytelling mode.

The sharp edged through-line of the performance is the contrast between legitimate and illegitimate force, and those responsible for making that distinction. It’s an undeniably challenging topic seen through the unique and ultimately effective filter of a father-daughter bond.

The personal and the political sit side by side in Nicklin’s remarkably compelling performance, a show to stir forgotten memories and spark new debates.

A Conversation With My Father is playing at the Northern Stage at St Stephens as part of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. For more information please see to the Edinburgh Fringe Website.