Do stories reveal the truth or conceal it? How much of truth is true? Are we all talking the same language or different ones? Almost Heaven was a deep, rich philosophical play about a couple exploring their enigmatic relationship by discussing the origins of language.

A man and a woman meet in a garden to tell each other stories, stories about stories, stories about language and communication. Biblical stories which go back to the very dawn of communication, the Garden of Eden, and culminate in the linguistic chaos of the Tower of Babel. Do the stories they tell enlighten or confuse? Do we know more or do we know less?

We don’t know who the couple are but we immediately detect a complex back-story which slowly, but incompletely, unfolds. Their uneasy initial meeting implies a failed marriage and separation, their own inability to communicate compensated for by them telling each other stories about communication.

Almost Heaven was powerful stuff created by Bill Buffery and Gill Nathanson which explored relationships and how we communicate within them and even the value and efficacy of language itself. This was good, authoritative, thought provoking theatre with two beautifully measured and sensitive performances which would have graced any stage and for which I can only offer the highest praise. My only criticism was that visually it was disappointing. I appreciate that they perform in all types of spaces and have to be flexible but I think they would have been better served by a less cluttered, perhaps more stylised, approach. But otherwise the MultiStory Theatre Company’s Almost Heaven was a little gem of a play skilfully performed by its creators. It is a pity they were only performing in the Everyman Studio on one day. I’m sure when word got round more people would have been keen to see it.  ★★★★☆    Michael Hasted   14/01/15