Absence offBilled as a “surreal comedy”, Absence Of… is a bewildering infuriating piece of theatre that never once in its dull hour could be called comedic. Indeed it was only by seeing its three actors bowing out to zero applause at its close that I could call it surreal.

Starting interestingly enough with its two main characters sat at either edge of the small stage, the piece quickly grows confusing and hard to follow. Within the detritus of a story, the characters mention that the set for a production hasn’t been delivered, hence the bare stage, but this notion is soon ignored in favour of bickering between the two leads.

Written and directed by its stars, Ryan Deponio and David Jon Winter, Absence Of… feels insular and indulgent. Jokes fly out and crash amid an unstable, unpredictable narrative that makes for a wholly unsatisfying experience. Both actors lack any distinct chemistry with each other, holding themselves awkwardly between exchanges lacking any heft.

At one point in the play a laptop is used and is seemingly controlling the action through what is being typed. This is a genuinely interesting idea, but one that Deponio and Winter use only for groan inducing misinterpretation – at one point for example Deponio questions why he is holding an ape, Winter elaborates that it was a typo for “wearing a cape”.

The only shining light here is Jon Love, an angry Scotsman who possesses genuine dramatic presence in spite of the unclear script he finds himself in. Whether delivering a wrought soliloquy on the edge of the stage or shouting in Deponio’s face, Love is a captivating presence who is simply done wrong by a confused, bloated script.

Perhaps with more narrative clarity Absence Of… could have been more, but with such muddled writing it struggled to hold the attention of the thin morning crowd who all seemed to leave questioning what they had just seen.

Absence Of… is at the Gilded Balloon (Venue 14) until 15 August. For more information and tickets visit the Edinburgh Fringe website.