When Unlimited Theatre’s Clare Duffy started researching the economic collapse that forms the backdrop to interactive performance Money The Game Show, there was one story which stood out.

“When Hank Paulson, the US secretary of the treasury, was trying to get the banks to accept cash injections to shore up the financial system, he was physically sick,” says Duffy.

“He foresaw what could possibly happen – that money could stop working and the globalised system of economics could stop working.

“There wasn’t a back-up plan. He was an ex-CEO of Goldman Sachs, with a personal fortune of millions of dollars, but he was really scared.”

It was the collapse of investment bank Lehman Brothers in 2008 – the largest bankruptcy in US history – which inspired Money The Game Show.

“I was wondering what was going to happen and was awestruck by the consequences that began to unfold,” says Duffy.

Paying the price

“The reactions to the crisis, the banks bailed out, whole countries going bankrupt, and the fact there wasn’t and doesn’t seem to be a proper plan – this is the story of our age, from our point of view.”

At the centre of Money The Game Show is £10,000 in £1 coins, which are placed in a heap in the centre of the stage.

“I made a play a few years ago about a relationship, where two people put a penny in a pot for every day they were together,” says Duffy. “The characters were sat around their dining room table with £500 in coins. I realised how interesting it is to put actual money on stage.

“Money is faith or belief – it’s a form of representation. A pound coin isn’t made of gold, its colour just reminds us of gold. They are connected to a value or service. By putting the money onstage it becomes something else, it becomes part of the framework of storytelling.

“We wanted to see the audience’s reaction to the question of what is the value of money and what would happen if it stopped working – as it nearly did and still could. We need to think about different ways of valuing and using money.”

The audience is divided into two teams, led by gameshow hosts Casino and Queenie.

The former hedge-fund managers lead their teams through a series of games based around the financial crisis – many relating to inflating a bubble or keeping a bubble alive.

“We are trying to examine the difficult language of banking,” says Duffy. “The principles are more straightforward than people might think. Every field of work has its own language, some of this is very arcane, particularly the types of credit that led to the crisis.

“It’s interesting to see now how much more the audience is familiar with certain terms, such as quantative easing, that we had to explain two years ago.”

Between the different rounds the two hosts explain how they got to where they are today.

“They don’t see themselves as bad guys,” says Duffy. “They are the warrior mavericks here to save the world.

“There were a small number of people who tried to short the sub-prime housing market – to make money out of the crisis by betting on the possibility that the investments would go completely bad.

“If people had listened to those people, they would have thought longer and harder about keeping the bubble growing.”

Although competition is at the heart of the play, the reward isn’t the money on the stage – so anyone hoping to walk off with more than they paid out for tickets will be disappointed.

“We have a security guard there every night to watch over the money and it is always being filmed on CCTV,” says Duffy.

“We wanted to make sure it wasn’t a game for nothing.

“To make sure the game is played competitively between the two teams the losing hedge-fund manager ‘kills’ themselves each night.”

  • Brighton Dome Studio Theatre, New Road, Wednesday, March 20, and Thursday, March 21. Starts 7.30pm, £12/£10. Call 01273 709709