Rabbits and Ferrets is listed in the Theatre section; a strange choice, as it is not in any sense a piece of theatre.  It’s a PowerPoint presentation, delivered by real-life social worker Beth Webb, drawing from her personal casebook to illustrate the myriad forms of abuse and neglect affecting children today.  According to her opening manifesto, she’s aiming to dispel some myths about social work and to explain how her chosen career offers its own rewards; but it must be said that, contrary to her stated intent, the tone of much of the piece is unremittingly grim.

Webb is an engaging speaker, using deft rhetorical devices and occasional forays into physical performance to illustrate the stories she tells.  But I’ve given a few PowerPoints of my own before now – and so I know that, the more words you have on the slides behind you, the less your audience listens to what you actually say.  In this case, Webb throws up complex legal definitions of four different types of abuse, which she illustrates with personal stories from her own career.  Webb’s delivery is heartfelt, but she’s spread herself too thinly; with so much ground to cover, she can barely get beyond the headlines, the procession of horrors which anyone who follows the news will have heard tragically many times before.

It’s important to remember that Webb is talking to a self-selecting audience: those with interest enough, and conscience enough, to attend her show.  So I’d have liked to have got beyond the hopeless head-shaking, and understood more about the daily dilemmas which surely define her role.  One anecdote involves a man who tries to remove his child’s plater cast with a hacksaw; it’s offered as an example of obvious neglect, but it sounds to me like a well-meaning misunderstanding of half-remembered advice.  Does that make me a foolish, even dangerous, liberal?  That’s the kind of question which would genuinely open my mind.

The strongest segment, I feel, comes towards the end, when Webb takes the time to fully explore the story of a drug addict who chooses to give up her child.  The nuts and bolts of the process have a compelling poignancy: Webb speaks movingly about the inevitable final meeting, the permanent severing of the maternal bond.  But it’s a hopeful story, too, stressing that care comes in unexpected packages and that social workers needn’t be the enemies of those whose lives they change.  If Webb develops this show further – and I hope she will do – then I’d suggest she focusses on just one or two stories, powerful stories like this one.

Viewed as a piece of theatre, or even spoken-word storytelling, Rabbits And Ferrets is inside-out.  As it stands, it’s a lecture punctuated by anecdotes; but compelling theatre almost always tells a story first, using that storyline as the framework which supports its themes.  The same technique, I think, could transform Webb’s talk from a well-delivered conference speech into something which makes sense as a stand-alone show.  Until then – despite the importance of the topic, and although Webb is a confident and personable speaker – I fear she may struggle to find a natural home in the Fringe.