Gentle, inventive and beautifully made — Hostile turns bits of wood,
clever gadgets and one brilliant performer into theatrical magic.
Kate Gaul
3.5 Stars
Venue: Edinburgh Festival
Edinburgh
2026
There is something particularly pleasurable about watching a performer make theatre from almost nothing. In Hostile, French company Bakélite send Olivier Rannou into a spaghetti western with some timber, string, clever gadgets, a few everyday objects and a great deal of theatrical ingenuity.
Rannou is the Hostile heart of the piece. He has a lovely physicality and a strong personality, and his cowboy is part Clint Eastwood, part cartoon character and part hapless survivor. This is entirely non-verbal theatre, so his face, body and precise manipulation of objects must do the storytelling. He is a generous performer who understands how to bring an audience into the game.
What I particularly liked about is its inventiveness and its materiality. Objects are not hidden or transformed through elaborate illusion; we see Rannou make the world happen. A piece of wood becomes something else, string becomes a snake, simple mechanisms produce surprisingly sophisticated theatrical effects. There are clever little gadgets and beautifully judged pieces of stage business, and a constant sense of anticipation: what on earth is he going to do with that?
The smaller-scale work is charming, although this is also where I had a reservation. From the back rows of Church Hill Theatre it was difficult to see some of the miniature detail. I wondered how this was working for the younger members of the audience, particularly when some of the pleasure comes from seeing exactly how the piece of wood reveals a character or landscape. Once the scale increases, however, the production really starts to surprise. The transformations become bigger and more theatrical, and there are some lovely moments when the audience suddenly understands what all those bits of material have been building towards.
The lighting and sound are important partners in this process. They give the relatively simple materials atmosphere and scale, creating a western landscape that can move from comic to slightly sinister and back again. The effect is surprisingly cinematic, without losing the handmade quality that is the production’s greatest pleasure.
There is also something very appealing about the gentleness of Hostile. It doesn’t over-explain itself or demand that we find a great meaning in its western adventure. Instead, it trusts the audience to enjoy the act of making. There are surprises, visual jokes and moments of genuine theatrical magic, but also a simple pleasure in watching an artist work with materials and turn them into a world. It is a reminder that theatre doesn’t necessarily need elaborate technology or huge resources to create something memorable. Sometimes a piece of wood, a performer with an idea and an audience willing to imagine are enough.
Hostile is gentle fun and beautiful theatre-making. Its small-scale work may be challenging to see from a distance, but as the world expands so does the theatrical pleasure. A lovely, inventive piece of object theatre that understands the joy of making something appear before our eyes.
Kate Gaul, Theatre Now
