Topless Mum - TNT

The tables are turned on the tabloids when wounded squaddie Barry (Alistair Wilkinson) sells a hungry young reporter an apparently incriminating picture saved on his mobile. The image purports to show British soldiers humiliating an Afghani prisoner, but – as everyone now knows (and as the Mirror's editor found out to his cost a few years back) - things aren't necessarily quite what they appear to be in this digitally enhanced age.
Playwright Ron Hutchinson manipulates his characters and their dialogue as shamelessly as the media blatantly massages the truth and as the army seeks (more subtly) to keep it hidden. Sylvestra Le Touzel is on commanding no-nonsense form as the military lawyer interviewing a soldier who may or may not have been involved in an event which may or may not have happened, and Louise Kempton's Tiffany reveals the streak of hard-nosed self-preservation she'll need to live with the physically and emotionally damaged husband who came home from the war. Next month, Hutchinson's excellent comedy "Moonlight and Magnolias" makes a welcome return to this theatre but, in the meantime, this more serious drama (with its not altogether convincing twists and turns) will keep you guessing until the brutal facts finally emerge.
Tricycle Kilburn High Road, NW6. (020-7328 1000). Tickets £20-£10. Until June 28.