With an ear-splitting crash, a wagon hurtles across the stage and stops at the edge. Out of it pour seven eastern Europeans dressed in rags. They could be immigrants arriving, perhaps illegally, in Britain today. The specifics don't really matter. Theirs is a story of migration and exile that could have taken place at any point during the last century.
Sclavi is a riotous hour spent in the company of the talented Czech company Farm In The Cave. The cast sing, dance and fight as they tell the story of an emigrant from Slovakia, who may have attempted a new life in America but is destined to never feel at home.
Drawing on fragments of song, verse and anecdote from Slovakia's rich history of the emigrant experience, the piece is not so much a narrative as a tonal cacophony of a people's grief, fury and desolation. For an English-speaking audience, this only enhances a story that's about the problem of language itself - all immigrants are outsiders, who struggle to be understood. And the music carries its own narrative power: stirring gipsy dances and aching folk laments soundtracking stories of violence and loneliness.
Performed with tender symbolism and a pounding passion, this is an all-too rare example of theatre you will instantly want to see again.
Until Aug 28 (except Tue), Aurora Nova @ St Stephen's (V8), 11am, £10 to £12. www.auroranova.org
Sclavi
Aurora Nova @ St Stephen's (V8), Edinburgh
