Fiona Peek’s new play Salt was co-winner of the Royal Exchange’s Bruntwood Playwriting Competition in November 2008, and the premiere of this sophisticated social comedy has been eagerly anticipated.  

The action takes place between July 2007 and March 2008 during the course of five dinner parties in Simon and Amy’s beautiful basement kitchen.  Simon’s stable law firm salary and Amy’s chic little gallery job provide them and their children with a lifestyle straight out of a weekend colour supplement.  However their two child-free friends Rachel and Nick (Amy’s old flame from college days) are struggling with debt now that his freelance journalism commissions are drying up and RSI has ended her orchestral career.

Fiona Peek’s debut play, with its skilfully interwoven themes of debt, fertility, work/life balance and food porn, thoroughly nails the late-noughties zeitgeist.  The other unacknowledged but ever-present problem plaguing the middle-classes is excessive recreational drinking - a vice which does more than its fair share to inflame the situation here.

Even if external circumstances didn’t play a part, the chemistry between Amy and Nick and their uninhibited flirting has “slow-motion car crash” written all over it.  Beth Cordingly’s smug Amy is still proprietorial of her ex, constantly reminding Rachel (and Simon) of how long they’ve known each other and therefore how much better she understands him than his wife does.

Simon Chadwick plays her husband as an uptight conformist pretending to be a laid back peacemaker.  He tries to remain aloof from the emotional maelstrom but this diplomacy only masks his diffidence towards the other couple.  You form the impression that if he and Amy were to divorce, she would get Rachel and Nick in the settlement.

Kevin Harvey’s slightly-scouse and immature Nick, one of those nightmare guests who can’t distinguish between a dinner party debate and a stand-up row, is stuck in the laddish culture of the 1990s, and Esther Hall’s brittle Rachel is as highly strung as her own violin when confronted with the dilemma of treating her immature husband as a child or making him face up to his responsibilities.

Ben Stones’ sleek set is like watching the window display in a designer furniture shop coming alive, and Jo Coombs’ fluid and fast-paced production captures the authentic tone of entitlement of the (apparently) affluent professional classes.

My only quibble is that the bombshell dropped in the dying moments is treated with such brevity and underplaying as to be almost subliminal - if this was on DVD you’d frantically rewind it trying to work out exactly what happened.  But even without a freeze-frame facility the first-night audience was highly appreciative of this witty and clever new play.

Salt is on until Saturday 20 February 2010

Prices: £4 (conc)-£9.50

Evenings: Mon-Sat @ 7.30

Matinees: Wed & Sat @ 2.30

Box Office: 0161 833 9833

www.royalexchange.co.uk