A Fight Against … review – Chilean playwright’s sparky sketches

Royal Court Theatre Upstairs, London
Pablo Manzi's political scenes, which span several decades and are powerfully performed, could perhaps lead to a future epic

Thirty years ago, the Royal Court introduced a Chilean playwright, Ariel Dorfman, with Death and the Maiden, a much-revived, twistily structured thriller about South American human rights abuses.

While theatre can have a one-hit-and-run attitude to distant politics, the Court has commendably kept an eye on Santiago. Its international programme mentors new writers in an initiative spawning several Court stagings, including Guillermo Calderon's B in 2017 and now, in sparky English by the same translator, William Gregory, Una Lucha Contra ... by Pablo Manzi.

A Fight Against ... (Una Lucha Contra ... ) is at the Royal Court theatre, London, until 22 January