Fire Fire – Arcola Theatre, London

Writer: John Webber

Director: Jennifer Tang

Fire Fire is a new play by John Webber, author of Spiderfly, nominated for an OFFIE in 2019. Fire Fire is an ambitious work directed by Jennifer Tang, with an ambitious touring programme ahead after its month’s run at the Arcola.

It’s a decade or two in the future. The reason for this is not entirely clear, other than it allows for elliptical references to ever-more-repressive government control. Clearly, we are still facing catastrophic climate change – AI hasn’t wiped us out yet, but the earth is baked dry, the air a scorched yellow. In this two-hander, young climate activist Paige is committed to protesting against the use of oil. When she comes across Eddie, a retired working-class employee of the local oil refinery, his predictable political views lead to an inevitable clash.

In retrospect, the set-up is rather contrived, Eddie insisting he’s organising an ‘event’ in this Essex country park which Paige’s activist group have held up by their demonstration. It’s supposedly Eddie’s memorial to Jim, his dead brother. But the scattering of Jim’s ashes doesn’t take place until much further down the line, and it’s never clear why he’d try to stop Paige using the park’s toilets – the reason for the clash in the first place. What follows is a series of scenes in which Eddie and Paige come across each other and continue to spar. We can guess the story arc: diametrically opposed in so many ways, a tentative friendship blossoms between Eddie and Paige as they come to value one another’s insights.

What is less predictable is the scope of the play, which takes us through ancient Essex burial mounds, known by locals as ‘pyramids’; Nigerian goddesses; the England some refer to as Albion; Gaia; pagan rituals and, of course, the symbolism of fire. Fire Fire is certainly full of energy, and both performers, Gabrielle Brooks as Paige and Chris Simmons as Chris, are excellent.

The play weaves together commentary on climate activism with down-to-earth insights about environmental damage to those who’ve worked in the oil refinery business. It is revealed that, beneath his Essex-lad chirpiness, Eddie is grieving the death of his brother, who died of asbestosis, having also worked in the local oil refinery. Paige, on the other hand, a young woman of Nigerian heritage, grew up in posh Colchester. She and her girlfriend Mel are committed to activism. But in the course of the play, we hear about the breakdown of their relationship when they disagree fundamentally over the question of whether or not to try for a baby.

The characters continue to share aspects of their lives they have kept secret until now, Paige revealing she’d been abandoned by her mother and Chris showing a hidden tenderness when he talks of his own family. These confidences certainly add to the characterisation. But there’s a danger in reducing political commitment to a by-product of psychological damage. Is Paige an environmental activist simply because she’s felt motherless? We just don’t get enough of her background to feel she’s anything other than a cypher. Indeed, this intensifies when Paige reveals she’s been deserted by her girlfriend and then, seemingly, by everyone else. Are we still meant to applaud her activism (there’s a plan to cause havoc in the Dartford Tunnel) if everyone else seems to be giving up?

Fire Fire certainly wants us to applaud, with a dramatic final scene in which the pair start to drum and summon up the spirits they revere. But to be honest, despite its good intentions, Fire Fire feels contrived. With its reliance on a panoply of pagan deities and practices, it seems as if Webber is trying to write another Jerusalem, with Eddie an incarnation of Jez Butterworth’s Rooster Byron. Eddie’s treasured golden cigarette lighter in Fire Fire, in particular, cannot but recall the cigarette lighter with which Mark Rylance as Rooster created such unexpected magic.

There is altogether too much underlining of the importance of signs and symbols. Plus the play’s repeated insistence on death being some sort of sacred passage to reunite those that have gone before feels whimsical.

The set by Peiyao Wang, lighting by Charly Dunford and sound by Sarah Spencer are all excellent, and Jennifer Tang’s direction makes for a brisk pace (even though the play extends beyond the advertised 80 minutes). Ambitious, entertaining but flawed.

Runs until 3 October 2026 and continues to tour