Shortlisted for the Total Theatre Award 2007 for 'Best Original Work by an Ensemble'

Audience members are exhorted to write down one thing that makes them scream (e.g. public transport, or sink hair, or clowns crossed out and replaced with indecision) and join a seminar where three women are learning to scream candidly and with vigour. Return to Reason unfolds from there. There’s a very minor trauma narrative which perhaps the piece started with, but this is actually less convincing or impressive than the (seemingly) easy dynamic between the members of the ensemble: a kind of performing rubato where the structure and interactions are elastic. You see it all the time in improvised music, but it’s a state that can only really exist when each of the performers has the ability to capture and displace attention -- in harmony. It’s all the more unusual in Return to Reason, the self-effacement, because the performers are regularly screaming -- but it’s why the piece ends up being so touching, so good and so likeable.
Total Theatre, 18 Aug 2007
Reviewer: John Ellingsworth

... fantastically enthusiastic and believable acting of the protagonists. This is slightly mad dynamic physical theatre showing off a range of nearly uninhibited human behaviour.
Three Weeks 11 Aug 2007
reviewer: Ulla Schott, United Kingdom

... These women could not put the show on at all if they did not already have a wonderful relationship of trust with one another and a dedicated commitment to both the project and their art. These are real people, sharing their vulnerability very openly, taking real risks. ... deeply convicing in its execution.
EdFringe.co.uk Aug 2007 
reviewer: Peter Bennett, United Kingdom

I must admit in the first five minuets of this show I felt very uncomfortable and wanted to leave, but if I did I would have missed a great show. ... a very interesting piece of theatre, with three very capable actresses and great direction ... go and see this show, you won’t be disappointed.
EdFringe.co.uk Aug 2007 
reviewer: Richard Marriott, United Kingdom

'I saw "return to reason" in edinburgh this summer and it was an amazing experience. one of the best things i've seen ever because of the way it reached in to the audience and gently included us so that we could never forget it. would love to be able to see you again, closer to home, in NYC!'
Edinburgh Fringe Festival Aug 2007
A. Perez, audience member

... a witty and fresh exploration on what it means to communicate and the difficulties of trying to live in the modern world. It was inventive, with great sparks of humour and uncomfortable truths battling for space in the vivid performances.
Shiobhan Davies Studios, London 2006
Will Mortimer, Director

...I really thought the work was of a high standard of creativity, and was a very good example to our young performers.
Stratford Circus, Dec 2006
Gary Horsman, Executive Director, Theatre Venture

Shortlisted for ‘Best Direction’ at the LOST Theatre Festival 2006

"I loved every bit of it … this piece told me Claudel's story in a way I haven't heard it before…"
Lost Theatre Festival, May 2006
Adrian Brown, Director/Producer, Adjudicator

"...I could feel the spirit of the artist"
Sergej Ostrenko, Director, IUGTE, Latvia 2006

"The feel of Elegguá was like listening to Portishead: I was absorbed throughout…"
Liverpool 2003
A. Wakefield, Director

"One of the best fringe shows I have seen in the past three years."
Liverpool 2003
Kate G., Audience Member

"When Paul McCartney and I started talking about LIPA, an event like tonight’s was one of the dreams we had in mind. Bless the LIPA students involved for turning their dream into our reality."
Liverpool 2001
Mark Featherstone Witty, Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts Principal & CEO

"The event is full of the totally unexpected: superb music, wonderful choreographic ideas and poems, visual ideas that stun and performers who know exactly what they are doing - there is not a dull moment throughout the hour" "Catch it next time or miss out on one of the most exciting artistic experiments seen in the city for a very long time"
Arts Diary Liverpool Daily Post April 2001
reviewer: Philipp Key