A Different Rhyme

SECOND in the Peacock's season of short lunchtime - plays by new authors is Lorraine O'Brien's A Different Rhyme, a comedy with a black, convoluted difference.

Out of the games people play stable, it is set on picturesque Killiney Hill, where two women meet, apparently for the first time. One has binoculars to help her savour the view, which happens to include two naked male bums. This adds relish to their hitherto guarded chat, which expands to take in bulges and other erotica.

Now that they have found something in common, the women really begin to confide in each other. Secrets emerge from under stones long unturned. Crime and punishment are on the menu as layer after psychological layer is stripped away. And just as the piled on agony begins to seem like whimsy overdone, a final plummet to a logical reality brings it all home safely.