Companhia Maior was associated with the 2014 Artist in the City biennial (Lisbon) and challenged artist Tim Etchells to write the original text for its team of performers. The result was The best fastest worst saddest longest most complex hardest funniest brought to the stage by the Portuguese director Jorge Andrade.

In the show, each actor speaks in turn and all mention something superlative – the something-est… Or, as we read in the title, the best fastest worst saddest most complex hardest funniest. But not just that. They also talk about the smallest thing in the world, and the largest, about the best way to die, the best city to fall in love in, the most dangerous idea in the world, the hardest thing to measure, the hardest thing to make disappear for good, the hardest song to sing at karaoke, the loneliest time of day, the hardest yoga position, the best way to get over the past, the best lovers, the worst way to fall in love, the best way to spoil a story while telling it, the best place to have sex, the most useful superpower you could have, the worst jokes, the best way to survive an Apocalypse, or a divorce, the household object that can be most easily turned into a weapon, the most pleasurable way of waking someone, the worst way to say no, the stupidest way to tell someone we love them, the best way to say goodbye and, finally, the best way to end a theatre event.

All this comes into the show, as if it were a contest of opinions that might happen at any family get-together, or when meeting friends, around a table having a drink, or an evening slouching on the sofa. Each actor says something even more impressive than the last, or merely expresses their idiosyncrasies: what makes them laugh, or feel afraid, or gives them hope. The words spoken by the actors, despite having been written by Tim Etchells, seem to come from them. Banal things. The things onto which we project our feelings in all their inevitable banality. The things that make us ‘human’. But, to say these things to the audience, Companhia Maior made it a bit more special. A gala night.