Harrogate, Royal Court Theatre

What’s incest got to do with a town in North Yorkshire? At first this seems a reasonable question to ask of Al Smith’s brilliantly written, if a little bit tricksy, play, which begins somewhere nearer to Guilford than to Leeds. The central character is Patrick, the father of an under-aged teen daughter, and husband of a hardworking doctor. The daughter has a best friend called Carly, and an older boyfriend called Adam.

At some point recently, she and Adam have gone to the northern town so that she can lose her virginity, so the title of the play is a wonderfully unlikely metaphor for an illicit adventure.

But it is, of course, not the only illicit feeling that pulses through this shocking and absorbing drama. At one point, the daughter asks her father, “Do you think we are inappropriately close?” An idea he immediately denies, but by then – more than halfway through the running time of 80 minutes – we know enough to question this denial. But Smith is much too clever to write a crass little play about incest. Or about abuse. All we really know, until the final thrilling scene, is that there is a strain of incestuous feeling between father and daughter, a bond that may or may not exist solely in Patrick’s head.

I dream about you young. When I’m asleep you’re as young as the girl I met

What’s so exciting about this debut play, which was first seen at last year’s HighTide Festival, is that the playwright has found a perfect form through which to explore the feelings and sensations of this family. Using two actors – one who plays Patrick and the other who plays the females in his life – he has created three scenes, each of which shows a different male-female rapport. It is a style of writing that is impressively intelligent, emotionally truthful and strongly resonant, and beautifully controlled. Being also a play about memory means that Harrogate has the capacity to surprise its audience at every turn.

As we watch Patrick struggle to create a satisfyingly erotic image inside his head, we can see that he is trying to recapture his youthful sense of desire, that strange land in which memory blurs with fascination. As the cover blurb on the playtext quotes: “I dream about you young. When I’m asleep you’re as young as the girl I met.” But can he recapture this sense of excitement through role play? And who will enact his ideal female? Because we know the actors are acting the role play episodes carry a particular charge – it’s the kind of play that would repay multiple viewings.

Richard Twyman’s production, which embarks on a UK tour after finishing its run at the Royal Court, buzzes with physical and psychological pleasures. Tom Piper’s empty and anodyne set suggests the blankness of a mind that peoples its thoughts with memories, while Nigel Lindsay and Sarah Ridgeway are perfect as the various combinations of couples. He acts differently because he plays different roles in life, as father and as estranged husband. She plays different females with meticulous attention to small gestures and vocal inflections. Some moments are electrifying. By the time that the final powerful metaphor of a patient coming, “breath-by-breath”, to realise their own mortality arrives, it is hard to deny that this is a magnificent study of the human heart in all its darkness, cruelty and hurt.

• Harrogate is touring until 16 November
• Read more theatre reviews on theartsdesk

@AleksSierz