A decade ago at Ludlow Fringe Festival, Duncan Macmillan, in collaboration with Jonny Donahoe, began an experiment blending storytelling and audience interaction in an intimate theatrical space through a play entitled Every Brilliant Thing. Having travelled both temporally and spatially, more than a decade has now passed. Does it survive the examination of time? My answer is: yes.
The last decade was not lacking in theatrical experiments consciously defying the “conventional” proscenium. The Encounter redefined the actor–audience relationship through binaural sound. RPG-like Sleep No More blurred the boundary between theatre and game. Fairview turned the gaze back. These works, like Every Brilliant Thing, constantly seek new potential, transforming theatre into an exposing business that, in turn, exposes the audience—restoring the nature of our human subjectivity.
We follow a narrator (Lenny Henry) who, as a child, begins compiling a list of all the brilliant things worth living for as a way to help their mother cope with depression and a suicide attempt. The list grows over the years, shaped by the narrator’s own joys, heartbreaks, and life events, with contributions and even bigger roles from audience members. Each interactive device exists not only for fun, but also serves a clear purpose that enhances the play’s richness both in structure and content.
While focusing on Macmillan’s recurring themes like depression, mental health, and talk therapy, Every Brilliant Thing is a genuine performance that invites everyone to be part of its “theatre-making process” rather than simply serving us something pre-cooked or preachy. We feel truly part of the show, responsible for the boy’s story, rather than lying back, irrelevant and judgemental. This feeling becomes especially strong when the protagonist calls for another “brilliant thing” on the list, but unlike the usual response from the audience, this time no one answers. At that point, he is completely alone—a moment when you realise just how much we, the audience, have actually shaped the performance.
Macmillan’s writing is both endearing and nostalgic, a feeling I haven’t encountered in ages. His language is equally funny and poetic, interweaving those brilliant things that are sometimes trivial, solid, and relatable, or reflective, uncanny, and lyrical at other times—or all of these at once.
The ending may feel a bit less edgy and a bit cheeky, more like a middle-class cinematic happy-ever-after myth than a piece of theatrical exposition. But that’s just personal taste. There was one poignant, heart-breaking moment that could have been seen as a resolution arc, though it may lack some logic if examined closely. Yet this is not a piece governed simply by logic. It feels instead like finding something long lost and unexpectedly precious.
Lenny Henry masters the space as if it’s his own living room—chilled, playful, and chatty. He is both a good old friend unfolding his life stories with that silly little list, and an acting coach inspiring and leading the audience members with full physicality to enrich the night.
From a practical perspective, rest easy if you are wary of audience interaction and don’t want to be put on the spot (as so often happens at Soho Theatre). While most are simply reading out items from the list, the company will check in with audience members before offering any of the “bigger parts”. Simply say no if you’d rather not be involved. I guarantee, you won’t lose a single bit of fun, nor will you shed any fewer tears.
