“There’s something perverted about a Christmas tree.” This unsettling line sets the tone for Christmas Day, a play that peels back the comforting surfaces of festive ritual to expose something far darker and more fragile beneath. What unfolds is a viciously funny, deeply unsettling family gathering that interrogates identity, faith, and belonging at a moment when the world—both personal and political—feels perilously close to collapse.

Set in an abandoned building somewhere above the Northern Line, with foxes prowling the deserted streets outside, the play situates a Jewish family celebrating Christmas Day in a space already marked by displacement and unease. The setting itself becomes a metaphor: a place between belief systems, between histories, between safety and threat. Christmas, usually synonymous with warmth and unity, is rendered uncanny—its rituals distorted, its symbols tinged with menace.

The family’s interactions oscillate between the mundane and the apocalyptic. They argue about race and Christianity, speculate about the end of the world, and engage in a seemingly harmless quiz game. Yet beneath these exchanges lie carefully concealed secrets, unresolved grief, and emotional wounds that surface with increasing violence. The humour is sharp and merciless, but it never feels decorative; laughter becomes a survival mechanism, a way to postpone the inevitable reckoning.

James Macdonald’s direction is precise and unsentimental. His handling of action and pacing allows tension to accumulate almost imperceptibly, until moments of rupture feel both shocking and unavoidable. Every beat appears meticulously calibrated, yet the performances retain a rawness that prevents the production from feeling over-controlled. The staging understands that discomfort is the play’s most powerful tool—and refuses to soften it.

Samuel Blenkin’s performance anchors the production with remarkable vulnerability. The final sequence, in which his blood-stained body is stripped and subjected to what reads as a ritualistic cleansing, is both harrowing and essential. This act of exposure—physical, emotional, and symbolic—functions as a kind of secular baptism. It is a moment of rebirth earned through suffering, culminating in an embrace that feels genuinely epic in its emotional release. The scene transcends realism, tipping into something almost mythic: a purification enacted not through faith, but through human connection.

Lighting design plays a crucial role in shaping the play’s atmosphere. Simple yet acutely responsive, it delineates space and emotional shifts with striking clarity. Scenes snap into focus or dissolve into shadow with a precision that heightens the sense of volatility, reinforcing the claustrophobic intensity of the environment.

Christmas Day is ultimately a play about the rituals we inherit and the damage we inflict while trying to maintain them. It exposes the fractures beneath familial performance and questions what redemption might look like in a world stripped of certainty. Uncomfortable, ferociously intelligent, and unexpectedly tender, it transforms a night of supposed celebration into a profound reckoning with belief, identity, and the desperate human need to be held.