Royal Exchange theatre, Manchester
Hiding behind the fluttering dialogue and domestic chatter lies a dark poetry in a pair of plays that address terrifying futures head on

Last month, wildfires ravaged southern California, President Trump issued executive orders on gender diversity and Storm Éowyn brought 100mph winds to the UK. Could any play be more timely than Caryl Churchill’s Escaped Alone, with its apocalyptic visions of raging fires, a God who punishes gender dysphoria and a wind that “turned heads inside out”?

First seen in 2016, this startling chamber piece juxtaposes the inconsequential chitchat of four retired women with alarming descriptions of planetary destruction. Structured like a string quartet in which fluttering exchanges alternate with soulful solos, it is sometimes a leisurely free association, ranging from antiques to cats, soap opera to superpowers, and sometimes a terrifying catalogue of rising waters, miscarriages and societal collapse.