A tangle of nonsense from the sloppy Caryl Churchill: A Number, at the Old Vic, reviewed

A Number, by Caryl Churchill, is a sci-fi drama of impenetrable complexity. It’s set in a future society where cloning has become possible for those on modest incomes. A Cockney father reveals to his grown-up son that he’s a replica of his older brother who died, aged four, in a car crash that also killed his mum. The son reacts with anger and bafflement. But Dad soothes him with happy news. The boy’s DNA was stolen by a gang of scientists who created 20 more copycat zombies, and these replicas are now scattered across the globe. Dad plans to cash in by suing the boffins for £5 million.

No sooner has Dad finished this yarn than he admits it’s untrue. The mother didn’t die in a car crash and the timeline he gave was incorrect. At which point the poor playgoer starts to wonder what fresh hoaxes are about to be pulled by this sloppy and amateurish dramatist. The son (played by Paapa Essiedu) meets his cloned brother (also played by Paapa Essiedu). We don’t see the meeting because there’s only one Paapa Essiedu. The boys argue. Violence is in the air. One Essiedu kills the other and the script turns into a murder mystery.

But not for long. Dad hops over to the US and meets a third cloned son (played by Paapa Essiedu). The American lad is a friendly buffoon whose dimwitted chatter is presented for comic effect while his solemn English father listens with an air of long-suffering superiority. (NB: Americans rightly loathe that kind of British condescension.) As for the father’s court case against the evil boffins, that’s forgotten. The murder of Paapa Essiedu by Paapa Essiedu is quietly sidelined.