The story centres around separated twin sisters, who are born after an archaeologist working in Mesopotamia rapes a local woman. This is the main secret within the plot, and is woven in stylishly.

The first time we see the archaeologist take a picture with his camera of the woman as she tries to hide behind her veil, and the stage goes dark as the camera flashes.

When the lights come back on we see the Woman lying in a heap. I liked how this symbolic scene contrasted with how we eventually see this scene ‘as it really happened’ end of the play.

The woman eventually gives birth to twins, but one is snatched by Paul-Émile, the archaeologist and only named character in the play. One girl is brought up by her mother and rather strange and strict husband in a basic house with a simple life.

The other girl is brought up by her father in more affluent circumstances and had ‘on stage’ pink wallpaper and a CD player.

Incidentally, the play’s music was atmospheric, consisting of highly charged emotional piano tunes played loudly through the action on stage.

The set was largely desert-orientated with sand-dunes at the back of the stage for most scenes. A highlight scene as far as staging goes was when the daughter who lives with her mother looks out of the window at some kind of traveling tradesman.

On the bottom right hand side of the stage you saw her back from an indoor perspective, whilst on the left you saw her looking out of the window from an outdoor perspective. Using identical masks I thought this was a well worked scene.

This scene happens after her mother has died, and the girl’s strange step-dad disapproves of her staring out the window which seemed a little harsh. Anyway after handing out some physical punishment he chucks her out.

Her journey takes her through a war zone but she eventually bumps into her sister, who has in the mean time been taken to the exhibition of her father’s Assyrian finds. It is here she has a flashback to when her mother was raped. This happens after she touches the eyes of a statue that was there at the time.

Together they manage to lay to rest the awful secret that has been giving them nightmares. We delve gradually deeper into these dreams during sections when an animated video is projected onto the screen at the back of the stage, before eventually seeing the entire thing at the end.

This play was definitely a case of style over substance. It had lots of interesting and unique aspects but I think the plot could have been more detailed. The visual acting was top notch though and the masks certainly leave a lasting impression on the audience.