Every Brilliant Thing

@SohoPlace

Playing until 8th November 2025

Book tickets

Photo credit: Danny Kaan

{PR Gifted ticket}

Starring five different rotating performers, this one-person play speaks of a time when our main character started a list of things that made them happy, a list they started after their mother’s first suicide attempt. In this performance, the narrative is led and delivered by Sue Perkins, who engages with audience members as they start to flood into the auditorium, before handing them lines to read and things that bring our main character joy.

Taking us on their life journey, from her childhood through to university, falling in love and the eventual passing of her mother. Growing up and evolving with our narrator, the things that bring happiness to her life naturally shifts, from ice cream, staying up late to watch TV and watching people fall over in her childhood to more romantic gestures, highlighting love and all the accompanying sweetness that comes with growing up. Don’t be fooled into thinking that everything that can make our character happy is associated with something deep and meaningful, the dialogue throws in the odd things delivered in an utterly comical way, such as weird sounding words like “goggles” and simply “Sigourney Weaver” without giving a hint of context.

Even though the play first depicts sadness, depression and suicide through the lens of our main character looking at her own mother, it is also evident that she experiences such feelings and issues as she navigates through life, both in response to her mother’s deteriorating mental health and also as part of growing up and trying find a purpose in her own path. While our character acknowledges that the list had been started, paused and forgotten time and again, it also serves as an undeniable anchor that always reignites her way out of darkness. 

The delivery and momentum of Every Brilliant Thing is greatly dependent on the willingness and enthusiasms of participating audience members, and by engaging with selected people before the play starts, the performer is able to ensure the right people have been selected to take part. This also means the chance of an awkward performance is greatly reduced. Perkins in the driving seat of this performance showcases her ability to respond spontaneously to situations. For example, she asks members of the audience for a book to help propel the progression of the story, Perkins gets creative in how she makes use of the material and is able to spin a humorous tale irrespective of what she is given, further highlighting her ability to quickly adapt and think on her feet to entertain.

Having had the pleasure of seeing an earlier performance by Johnny Donahoe and now Sue Perkins, equally fantastic in their own ways, I am almost certain that all of the performers selected for this part have the pre-requisite skills and aptitude to fully deliver on this role. Very cleverly, the message contained within Duncan Macmillan’s script is universal and relatable to people of every gender and background, and guarantees a fantastic show irrespective of the performer you see on the day.  

Despite the heavy themes of the play, it does not trivialise the significance of mental health, but instead, appreciating and embracing it for what it is. It highlights grief as part of life and something that could be overcome, and this is precisely why we have the joyfulness and hope interspersed throughout the production. A truly remarkable script and production, Every Brilliant Thing puts the emphasis on some of the more simple, profound or silly events as guiding lights for the darker moments, enabling this story to find a way to forge a connection at multiple levels with the audience irrespective of background and age.

Creatives

Writer and Co-Director: Duncan Macmillan

Co-Director: Jeremy Herrin

Set and Costume: Vicki Mortimer

Lighting: Jack Knowles

Sound: Tom Gibbons