The setting: the back garden of Eve's small house in a rural community, filled with the animals her son loves looking after. It's all poor James will ever be able to do, with his "problems". The time: 2013, when local boy made good Danny Stanton's film company is in town on a shoot; alternating with flashbacks from 10-15 years ago when the boys were at school together and Eve and Danny's mother's lives gradually drifted apart.

Matthew Parvin's entry into the 2013 New Writing Festival explored the fissures in the lives of his characters, in an intense and claustrophobic drama. Danny Stanton (Douglas Grant) has arranged for James (Benedict Nicholson) to come and work with the animal trainer on the film set, to atone for his guilt at not standing up against James's bullies all those years ago. There's just one problem - mother hen Eve (Maddy Herbert) isn't happy about the offer. What would James do without her?

Maddy Herbert wrung dark comedy out of her lines, pronouncing things "stupid", and keeping up a convincing west country accent throughout. The audience pitied her plight, abandoned by former friends who are too busy climbing the social ladder to bother with her, until a shocking denouement which showed how far she would go to keep her family together.

James was beautifully and sympathetically portrayed - utterly believable as having unidentified difficulties with life. Danny was more difficult - possibly because for either writer or actor, Danny is too close a character fit, and so he never came under the same detached scrutiny. At any rate I didn't believe the strength of his sense of guilt, which should have been the driving force of the narrative.

At times the mise en scene seemed a little awkward, and static exchanges meant the play could have been adapted for radio with little difficulty. But there were also excellent theatrical scenes - a semi-delusion in a hospital for instance - and some live chicks which were a dedicated touch! And of course the crux of the play, in which the audience's gasps showed they fully believed the pain they were witnessing. To pull off that utter belief in the story, especially in the BT where the audience are so close to the actors, was impressive theatre.

Having seen Roost, I'm not surprised to learn that Parvin won this year's New Writing Festival prize. I look forward to see what he writes next.