Tanya Moiseiwitsch Playhouse, Sheffield
Holden and Ed Stambollouian’s one-man drama based on a real-life murder in 80s America uses film tropes to great effect – but it plays with the facts too

Two wrongs don’t make a right, or do they? Ken Rex McElroy was “the town bully”, the things he did, or is said to have done, were bad: arson, assault, cruelty to animals, statutory rape, theft. On 10 July 1981 he was shot dead in his pickup in the presence of dozens of townsfolk. No one has ever been charged with his murder.

Subtitled “A True Crime Thriller”, this new play, set in the American midwest, is based on actual events and real people. How “true” it is to either is questionable. Co-writers Jack Holden, who performs all onstage roles, of which there are least 11, and Ed Stambollouian, who directs, say they have “changed or imagined” facts “for dramatic purposes”. The distinction between dramatic licence and misrepresentation, always fine, here feels blurred.

Kenrex is at the Tanya Moiseiwitsch Playhouse, Sheffield, until 16 November