Outside In Oran Mor, Glasgow

Jay is a ti mid lad who lives with his mum, and doesn’t go out much; not even to tackle the downstairs neighbour about the continuous me owing of his unhappy cat, or to buy a muchneeded pint of milk. This quiet life takes a dramatic turn, though, when someone shoves a gun through Jay’s letterbox while his Mum is out working a late shift att es co; and the gun is followed in short order by Coco – a young amateur criminal put in charge of the shooter by some more serious local thugs – and by Coco’s favourite police officer, Kayleigh, who has been monitoring his antisocial behaviour for some time, but is now about to quit the force in a fit of existential despair.

This is the situation out of which well-known screen writer Chris Grady conjures his second Oran Mor play, Outside In; and the result is a perfectly sculpted little farce full of brilliantly unexpected and sharply perceptive absurd i st detail,

from the sudden revelation of the feisty personality beneath Jay’s timid exterior, to the genial Coco’s hilarious insistence that Jay follow the script for his would-be life as a Glasgow hard man, even though Jay has other ideas.

In the end, the two become firm friends; and with Cristian Ortega and Martin Quinn turning in a near-perfect pair of comic performances as the two lads, and Katie Barnett offering wonderfully sardonic support as officer Kayleigh, Sally Reid’s pitch-perfect production powers to a hilarious conclusion, full of perfect comic timing, wicked social satire and sheer generosity of spirit.

Oran Mor, Glasgow, today, and the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh, 11-15 September.