Review by Giada
1.17am, or until the words run out is a searing, intimate two-hander about grief and friendship. At its heart lies a difficult question: how do you hold space for someone else’s pain when you are still drowning in your own? It also confronts the unsettling reality that death fixes a person in memory, preserving them as they were, unresolved and unchangeable. These are the truths Kate is forced to confront.
On the night before her late brother’s belongings are taken away, she visits his room for the first time in years. Surrounded by his things, she searches for clues and hidden meanings, trying tounderstand him one last time - perhaps for the first time. The unexpected arrival of Roni, once her closest friend, disrupts that fragile solitude. Roni comes with her own memories and her own reasons for being there. Confined to the room together, it is Kate’s morbid need for answers that ultimately opens up the possibility of reconciliation, but not without dragging each other through hell first.
Zoe Hunter Gordon’s writing is vivid and emotionally clear. She captures the shared language of long-standing friendships: codes, gestures, unspoken history. Of love that never truly disappears, but has been distorted by secrets kept in the name of protection. From our position as the audience, we can see how much they still mean to one another and cannot help but root for them to find their way back.
Catherine Ashdown (Kate) and Eileen Duffy (Roni) lean fully into the characters’ opposing traits. It is striking to watch how they process pain and grief: Kate viscerally, almost destructively; Roni cerebrally, guarded and controlled. Their opposing rhythms create a charged dynamic that locks you in. Sarah Stacey’s direction is delicate and measured, allowing the script’s intensity to build naturally. The world she creates feels intimate and recognisable, and her staging moves with a quiet choreography.
1.17am, or until the words run out is a powerful watch, and its strength lies in its simplicity: one room, two people, and the unbearable weight of what has been left unsaid.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
1.17am, or until the words run out runs at Finborough Theatre until 7th March 2026. Tickets are available from https://www.finboroughtheatre.co.uk/productions/117am-or-until-the-words-run-out
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