A Play On Words at St Andrew Square Review
A Play on Words should be on the Fringe planner of all word geeks this August. If you’re the type of person whose blood pressure shoots up at the sight of a misplaced apostrophe, you would really enjoy this play. The first half is entirely devoted to those of us who are pedants when it comes to the English language; it is somehow even funnier because the actors are both American.
After their opening banter about different ways of saying ‘what’s up’, the phrase ‘I don’t give a hang’ is examined and discussed at length by Rusty and Max. This was a phrase I had never encountered before, so I assumed it must be an Americanism that had bypassed the UK. I looked it up (obviously) and lo’ and behold, it is an old American idiom which means much the same as ‘I don’t give a damn.’
They set off down a wordy rabbit hole trying to establish where the phrase came from, which results in a comedic routine, questioning whether or not a moose head was originally involved. Absurdist and funny, this bit portrays the way the mind shoots off on its own tangents, which don’t always make sense.
There is a visible shudder when Rusty says the word ‘entomology’ and proceeds to explain that it is the study of the origin of words. Thankfully, Max rescues the audience by correcting him. The word ‘etymology’ is the study of insects, not words; Rusty meant to say ‘etymology.’ We all breathe a collective sigh of relief.
And yes, that’s the kind of crowd we were, which is why I feel they should have kept to that format - indulging us in our pedantry. But, for some unknown reason, the play took a political turn, which broke the flow and the attention of the audience with its suddenness.
The second part was all about the friends trying to come up with a slogan for a protest placard for an upcoming rally. This new focus threw me and some of the audience as we tried to discern where this change in direction was taking us. By the end of the play it still wasn’t clear why they had added this segment. If they were trying to prove the very loose hypothesis from the beginning that ‘language isn’t communication’, there were other ways they could have devised this to prove their point.
The performance itself was excellent, word-perfect with neither actor missing a beat, even with all of the alliteration and tongue-twisters that had me holding my breath. It’s perhaps not the most outstanding show of the Fringe, but it is a bit of light-hearted fun. If you find yourself in the vicinity of St Andrew’s Square, give it a whirl.
A Play On Words plays at Front Room at Assembly @ St Andrew Square until 30 August
★★★
Written by Sharon for Theatre and Tonic, August 2026.
