Big bucks and small potatoes in a political thriller in Pakistan

The Invisible Hand

Image by Tricyle

At the start of The Invisible Hand, with a handcuffed US bank trader and his Pakistani guard on stage, it looks as though the play will be about Muslim fundamentalism and terrorism.

But author Ayad Akhtar confounds our expectations in this witty political thriller as he turbocharges his way through a series of plot twists and turns.

All four characters are on the make, or more accurately, the take. Even the put-upon young guard, Dar, takes time off to act on Nick Bright’s advice and make money selling potatoes – and, tellingly, transferring the rupees into dollars. 

But small potatoes are not the terrain of Bright, who past triumphs include a $20 million trade on behalf of a Pakistani family; Bashir, the idealistic firebrand Hounslow lad who proposed the kidnap; and Imam Saleem, a one-time campaigning journalist who is frustrated by endemic corruption and intent on improving the lives of the people around him. They think in millions - $10 million, initially, to be raised by Bright to secure his release, with help, since the captive isn’t allowed to touch a computer, from the volatile, quick-to-learn Bashir.

That’s the deal that sets off a spiral of ever-more cataclysmic events.

The danger of the play getting bogged down by didactic explanations about currencies, trades, options and other banking dark arts is counterweighted by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Ayad Akhtar’s cracking writing and director Indu Rubasingham’s aggressive production, seen in the way the stage arrows out into the auditorium and in the occasional scene-opening blinding light.

Although all the action takes place in a single bare room (which becomes a crudely basic version of Bright’s former Citibank office), the violent events triggered by the mad-cap deal gradually begin to intrude. They finally swamp the plot, but overall the intensity and pace are a knock-out.

Religious fundamentalism and terrorism? No, the moral seems to be that the love of money is the root of all evil.

* The Invisible Hand is at the Tricycle, 269 Kilburn Road, NW6, until 2 July.  Info: 7328 1000/  info@tricycle.co.uk