But this is far from the darkest place the play will take us into, and we're in firmly tragicomic territory as Mark suffers a devastating loss, but deals with it by continuing to make up the superhero adventures he and his daughter used to invent together.
It's certainly tricky territory to navigate, but Weinman and director Clive Judd are up to the challenge of the tonal differences McDowall has given them to play with. They're helped by the playful animations that Will Monks projects onto Georgia De Grey's papier-mâché set, creating a world that seems to exist inside a child's mind, while regularly being put through the filter of an adult's point of view: Whether that be a comic diversion into how the other superheroes would actually feel about Batman's superpower being money, or the performance clueing us into the fact that we're actually inside someone's mental breakdown.
Because apart from the bereavement that's caused it, there's the gradual realisation that Mark's withdrawal into the Captain Amazing character is more complete than it initially appeared, and that McDowall is unlikely to neatly tie it up for us. It adds an element almost of creeping horror to a play that already juggles the disparate elements of comic silliness and intensely personal tragedy; McDowall and Weinman are so successful at pulling this off that you forget how audacious a mix that actually is.
Captain Amazing by Alistair McDowall is booking until the 25th of May at Southwark Playhouse's Little Theatre.
Running time: 1 hour 10 minutes straight through.
Photo credit: Ali Wright.
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