Alecky Blythe's biggest hit, the verbatim musical
London Road, debuted in 2011, but away from the theatre that year's biggest news story was one that Blythe was out recording as the basis for her latest play.
Little Revolution debuts three years on from the riots and looting that followed the killing of Mark Duggan by police, and focuses in particular on Hackney. Joe Hill-Gibbins' production goes back to Blythe's trademark performance style, which sees the play's "script" edited as an audio file from original interviews; the actors perform with earpieces through which this is played, so their performances retain the pace and cadences of the real people they're portraying. In keeping with the chaotic events it deals with the play has a particularly rough-and-ready feel, Ian MacNeil's design seeming to have almost blasted the Almeida apart to form a chipboard in-the-round set.
