Linck & Mülhahn

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Scene changes on Simon Wells’ stark, revolving set – of a staircase, a landing and a wall – are accompanied by jarring bursts of rock music including The Sex Pistols and The Clash. com shall not be deemed to endorse, recommend, approve and/or guarantee such events, or any facts, views, advice and/or information contained therein.But when he meets passionate young Catharina Mülhahn, so strong is the attraction that the match becomes inevitable. Bain, who is non-binary, released a video statement on Instagram addressing some of these concerns, and Hampstead offered free preview tickets to trans and queer individuals who wanted to see the show but couldn’t afford a ticket.

There are certain language choices – for example, a 22-year-old saying ‘fart’ – designed to bring a more modern slant to the 18th century story, but unlike flatulence, it feels forced. For all the talk about respecting one’s “true essence”, it’s pretty noticeable that Thomas isn’t writing from her own experience here, and thus isn’t able to fully engage with the nuance involved.Maggie Bain and Helena Wilson are winning enough as Linck and Mülhahn, yet the characters are never more than one-dimensional. Imaginatively reverse-engineered from a historic trial document, Ruby Thomas’s tale of a couple who pioneered gender flexibility in 18th century Prussia is, ultimately, a bit of a mess.

And the closing attempt to imagine a different future feels unearned, and tonally disjointed from what's gone before. There’s only so much one can speak to this issue as a cisgender critic, but there’s certainly some elements to the writing which don’t quite land as comfortably as they should, feeling clunky or otherwise out-of-place. Some may well consider it harsh that I’ve made such a comparison, rather than consider its full originality, but there are many striking parallels: the riotous music underpinning the entire story; the absurd rigidity of a traditionalist court; and even the flat out refusal at the very end to conclude with trans trauma and suffering, replacing it with an alternative, joyful ending.

But the whole thing is too gimmicky and too self-conscious in its juxtaposition of different eras to really work. The polite harpsichord music of balls and boudoirs is fractured by ecstatic blasts of music from the 20th-century counterculture, as the can of worms is cracked open by a versatile 10-strong cast. Linck was executed by sword, as befitted a male soldier, rather than by burning, the punishment for a woman: proof that the authorities couldn’t pin down what, precisely, offended them about the couple, at a time when religious certainties were also shifting. Dashing soldier Anastasius Linck has no intention of falling in love, but a chance encounter with the rebellious Catharina Mülhahn changes everything.