The last time I saw Mark Thomas live on stage, some poor fool at the Old Fire Station had just told him to stop swearing when referring to the late Queen. Given that Thomas has been using his blunt, incisive and uncompromising comedy stylings to speak profane truth to power since the 80s, you couldn’t help but wonder what exactly this concerned citizen was expecting when they saw his name on the bill. His response, peppered liberally with the exact offending word that made this punter’s hair curl in the first place, was to ask why we are urged to extend courtesy to a monarch, but not to their colonised subjects, or to the citizens who starve because the funds that could have fed them went to a state funeral? Thomas never whitewashes his critiques under any pretense of civility; his profanity is profound. And this very much remained the case with England and Son, written by Ed Edwards and performed solo by Thomas at the North Wall; a guttural and unflinching insight into a cycle of abuse trickling down from empire to family.

The play only makes up one half of the act; the first half is a devised piece Thomas and Edwards collaborated on with recovering addicts at a Manchester community rehab, where the pair volunteer teaching stand-up and storytelling and creative writing, respectively. Edwards is teaching the group the five act structure of storytelling - storytelling, Thomas tells us, is crucial to an addict’s recovery, establishing an arc over which you have control. He is an extraordinary mimic in this segment, embodying each character with their own distinct physicality; elastic-faced Richard with his slightly doddery bearing; Tommo, Irish, all sharp edges and jittering feet; plummy, languid accountant Niall; endearingly ditzy Hayley; these make up just a few of this extensive cast.

But Thomas’ talent for impersonation belies what’s really at the core of the piece; real, good-faith engagement with each member of the group as individuals. The five act narrative structure acts as a framework for experiences of addiction that are as complex and multifaceted as the group members Thomas inhabits, and it takes a great capacity for empathy to be able to convey the varied characters of so many people in such a short span of time. Their stories are lewd and subdued, defiant and regretful, devastating and hopeful, and Thomas handles them all with a deftness and consideration often not granted by the world at large.

This sets us up neatly for the main event, and the contrast could not be more pointed. The neutral ground of a meeting room is gone. Thomas, previously seated as group moderator, lies prostrate and screaming on the ground - our titular ‘Son’ has hit rock bottom in the bins behind the Wetherspoons. What follows is a journey through a labyrinth of addiction and juvenile offenses, guided by a winding thread of abuse to the bulldog waiting at its centre. ‘England’, our hero’s father, is both an icon and an instrument of empire; “England used to make things, son,” he opines as they tear apart an abandoned lot for scrap; later he holds court on his military exploits in the former Malaya as his son sits rapt with attention and hero-worship. But with time, that myth gives way to gruesome reality, and England’s true capacity for violence becomes impossible to ignore or defend.

England and Son was written for Thomas specifically - he quips ruefully that he’s now received his best reviews for a play he didn’t even write - but the combination of his performance and Edward’s script is undeniably potent. Again, Thomas’ chameleonic delivery gives us breathless eight-year-old excitement, compensatory teenage bravado and bellowing, abject adult misery, feeding into each other in a recursive loop (complemented by some inspired quick fire lighting design). Edward’s script does an excellent job of conveying how Britain’s military and imperial paternalism set its roots in the hearts of its soldiers before spreading inexorably to their fist, or how the cycle of abuse moves from the kitchen table to the detention centre as our son suffers through Thatcherite Britain’s “short, sharp shock” policies for juvenile delinquents. The horrific legacy of the former Malaya recurs as a bloody calling card to trigger his worst impulses. Whether in the form of his father or the state, the course of his life is indelibly marked by England, made brutally clear in a chilling one-man ‘father-son’ talk in the show’s closing moments.

This was harder to watch than I expected, and that’s for good reason. Not that there aren’t moments of levity; there are certainly enough running gags to break the tension when it’s called for. But it is blistering, angry and deeply, almost excruciatingly vulnerable at points, as it should be. Thomas and Edwards are not here for your comfort, because you’re sitting comfortably, you’re inclined to do nothing - and doing nothing, that’s the problem.