Jason Loewith and Joshua Schmidt's
Adding Machine, based on a 1923 piece of
expressionism and getting its UK premiere from Josh Seymour at the Finborough,
follows Mr Zero (Joseph Alessi,) who works in a large store, adding up figures in
the back room. He's had the same job for 25 years, the same amount of time he's been
married to Mrs Zero (Kate Milner-Evans,) who mainly screams abuse at him through the
medium of opera. Zero believes that his 25-year anniversary at work will surely be
marked with a promotion to the front store, but in fact his boss (James Dinsmore)
cheerfully informs him he's being fired and replaced with an adding machine. Zero's
reaction to being discarded is violent, and he soon finds himself on Death Row
alongside Shrdlu (Edd Campbell Bird,) a highly religious murderer who's looking
forward to getting tortured in Hell for his crimes.
