Edinburgh Theatre: It’s shaping up to be a vintage Fringe of new writing at the Traverse. Splendid offerings from the likes of David Greig and Daniel Kitson are already creating a buzz but the prime-time slot of the opening weekend was given over to Dennis Kelly’s gripping, if bleakly chilling, examination of contemporary urban isolation and violence.

Husband and wife Danny (Jonathan McGuinness) and Helen (Claire-Louise Cordwell) are enjoying a romantic dinner at home when Helen’s brother Liam (Joe Armstrong) arrives covered in blood. He found a “lad on the Tarmac” lying wounded, he says, and tried to help him. Danny’s all for calling the police but Helen fears Liam’s “unlucky” record with the forces of law.

It might well be grim on the gang-ridden streets outside but as the night spirals out of control in this tightly coiled world, it’s grisly indoors too, as family loyalties are stretched to breaking point and beyond.

Roxana Silbert’s intense production, on a claustrophobic domestic set from Garance Marneur that appears to fold ever inwards on itself, is a perfect match for the edgy dynamic of Kelly’s writing. The accents are estuary and the dialogue staccato, as the siblings’ thwarted emotions are intriguingly reflected in their linguistic poverty. Cordwell in particular is magnificent as she bullies the men and brutalises the syntax, desperate to protect the brother who has been her albatross since the death of their parents.
Kelly offers the sort of heightened-reality writing in which sentences are rarely finished and everyone uses their interlocutors’ names constantly. Two hours of this can begin to feel like slightly too much of a good thing, and tension ebbs during an overlong interval.

Occasional sharp jabs of humour work splendidly, though, and the Traverse has an undoubted hit.
Until 30 August (www.traverse.co.uk . Soho Theatre from 30 September).