At first glance, Sea Wall, written by Simon Stephens and directed by Stephens and Andrew Porter, does not visually amount to much. It’s set in a cluttered studio, with only one camera angle, and Andrew Scott, dressed in a plain outfit of jeans and a polo, turns on the camera himself. However, in a short half-hour, the play reveals itself as a tragically beautiful piece of art – far more than meets the eye.

Andrew Scott is well known for his roles in Sherlock, Black Mirror, and Fleabag, as well as his numerous stage appearances.  Scott is recognizable for the physicality of his acting, and his emotionally fraught portrayals of the characters he plays. He has shown himself to be a master of emotions, and his performance as Alex in Sea Wall is no different – his body language, facial expressions, fidgets, and small noises in between his lines all add up to create the perfect portrayal of Alex’s feelings. Scott brings a sort of twitchy nervousness to this character. As he waves his hands about, paces back and forces, and tears up repeatedly, the angst he feels is passed along to the audience, and the events of the play feel almost too real.

The performance starts off seemingly upbeat – although perhaps with an undercurrent of something more. Alex, slightly neurotic, describes his life and relationships with his wife (Helen), young daughter (Lucy), and father-in-law (Arthur), in haunting present tense. He repeats time and time again how happy he is, how satisfied he is with the little life he’s built, how nice it is to have a simple routine, and how lovely it is to go to his father-in-law’s cottage on the south of France. He repeats this over and over, until it slowly begins to dawn on you that something is amiss – someone truly content with their life would not repeatedly reinforce how happy he is. Eventually, Alex reveals that he has “a hole running through the center of [his] stomach.” He continues to elaborate on this until he reveals the cause of the metaphorical hole: a horrifically tragic accident that leaves his little family in utter shambles. This tragedy signals the end of normal life forever for Alex, Helen, and Arthur.

Sea Wall was written in 2009 by Simon Stephens, specifically for Andrew Scott to perform live. The prose of this play is haunting – the simplistic words mixed with the hugely traumatic events described create an unsteady balance, and allow the play to feel truly real. This play touches on some of the heaviest subjects imaginable, and discusses religion and faith in an extremely loaded manner by boiling it down to deceptively simple questions: if there is a god, is he a man? Where is god now?