AS FAR AS WE KNOW
Edinburgh Festival Fringe
★★★★
“a challenging and unnerving piece”
Sam Ward has become a bit of a cult icon at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. I still remember one of his early shows Five Encounters on a Site Called Craigslist which played to an audience of about twenty people back in 2017. It was a huge hit, and since then he has returned again and again, with his signature style of storytelling that has the ability to both invite audiences in and sometimes scare them away.
As Far As We Know is his newest work and is perhaps the most challenging for audiences yet. At the start of the show, Sam is sat at a brown desk, on a brown chair, wearing a brown suit. On the table, a microphone, a lamp and a glass of water. Split into three parts, the first part sees Sam telling us a story. It’s a story about a woman who is searching for an answer, triggered by the appearance of mysterious humming holes in her garden. Sam ensures us not to worry if we get lost because everything will be OK. He then proceeds to spend twenty minutes or so telling us the first part of the story at rapidly increasing speed. We meet various characters: an angry receptionist, a stressed-out bank manager, a detective who has a tendency to swallow a cigarette before lighting another. The detail is delicious but passes so fast so you might struggle to catch it all. The woman frantically searches for the answers, and it seems increasingly like there might be a huge scandal about to unfold. It’s incredibly overwhelming, with an escalating soundtrack and lights that flash and pulse as things get faster and faster and faster.
Just at the point where I can hardly take any more of it, there’s a gear shift. Ward’s voice moves to text. Everything slows down. But then things become menacing, eerie, with sound design by Carmel Smickersgill giving the story a rich, cinematic quality, an unsettling feeling rising through the audience as nature sounds are paired with the sort of screeching instruments you might find in a horror movie. Eventually, another gear shift for the third and final part. Then, eventually, the end…sort of.
It’s a challenging and unnerving piece that I’m sure will have different meanings for different people. It’s exploring our collective and individual desire for answers; answers in an age when we don’t even know what the questions are. We might be able to ignore the odd hole in the garden, but when they start expanding, multiplying, making noise, perhaps we’ve no choice but to start investigating. But what happens when no one has the answers? Or the answers lead to more questions? Or the answers don’t exist at all? After quite a stressful first half, I found the ending profoundly moving. We’re living in an age where we’re so acutely aware of the injustices in the world, on our streets, in our communities. But what are we actually doing about them? Is anyone doing anything at all? We hear of conspiracies, but what’s going to push us to ask the questions, and knowing where to look in the first place.
Along with a fantastic sound design, Lighting Design by Han Sayles enhances each moment of storytelling, at times showing Ward in nothing but a gentle glow, at others expanding or pulsing the lights, deftly shifting with the story’s turns and tensions. The piece is also very funny. But hardly gives you time to laugh.
The more I reflect on the show, the more admire its brilliance. When theatre is always meant to provide the answers and offer neat resolutions, As Far As We Know asks what might happen if there are no answers to find, and if the story has no ending.
AS FAR AS WE KNOW
Main Hall at Summerhall at Edinburgh Festival Fringe
Reviewed on 26th August 2026
by Joseph Dunitz
Photography by Mihaela Bodlovic
