Truth’s a Dog Must to Kennel

by Tim Crouch

And that's the moment when I leave.
The moment when the jokes fail us. When I fail. I fail.
This precise moment here, look, see with your ears.

The Fool leaves King Lear before the blinding. Before the killing starts. Before the ice-creams in the interval.

In his new solo work, playwright Tim Crouch draws on ideas of virtual reality to send the Fool back to the future of the play that he left. Back to a world without moral leadership or integrity; a world where wealth covers vice; where the poor are dehumanised; where the jokes fall flat; where live art has become the privilege of the few.

Truth's a Dog Must to Kennel is a daringly unaccommodating piece of theatre that switches between scathingly funny stand-up and an audacious act of collective imagining. King Lear meets stand-up meets the metaverse. Crouch's previous celebrated works include An Oak Tree, The Author, Adler & Gibb, Total Immediate Collective Imminent Terrestrial Salvation , and Beginners .

This edition was published to coincide with the production at The Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh in August 2022.

Genres: Plays

48 pages, Paperback

Published September 12, 2022

Reviews

[Amanda Grace · Rating 2 out of 5]

I imagine this work would be much clearer-cut on the stage, but as a script, I lost the intentionality behind too many conventions. I perceived a flip in thesis perspective, for instance, in what Crouch is "meta" (his words) in calling the fourth act. I'm not quite sure if this play is about its own narrative events or my reaction to them—e.g. if my experience is the play, after all; I'd be willing to rate this curated experience higher than the actual play, which made me engage with themes of priority between reality, but left me feeling lost rather than guided.

My reviews are always indicative of my own taste for a work, so it could be that this one just isn't for me, but I found its attitude slightly clichéd.

[Charlie Froy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beyond anything else.