There are moments in Claudia Rankine’s The White Card where you cringe for the characters on stage - and there are also moments where you question yourself.

First staged in America and now on its first UK tour, the drama raises numerous questions about race, privilege, understanding, misunderstanding, guilt, responsibility, depiction and appropriation - to name just a few.

The scenario initially appears harmless - Charles and Virginia, a white couple in America, are meeting a black artist, Charlotte, whose work they are considering buying for their art collection. But over dinner at Charles and Virginia’s house, layers unpeel, prejudices are unveiled and tensions rise. And what begins as a courteous discussion over Champagne descends into an angry and, at times vicious, series of arguments.

Of course there is always more below the surface than we initially think. Charles and Virginia have their skeletons in the cupboard, many of which are exposed when their son Alex, who believes he has the moral high ground and is more in tune with Charlotte than his parents, arrives.

Throw into the mix the art dealer Eric who is keen for the couple to invest in Charlotte and for her to become a member of the art foundation board to ‘tick the diversity box’ and it becomes a recipe for disaster.

Rankine captures the awkwardness of this meal in which people are jumping from potential head-on collision to skirting round the issues. There is an unspoken agreement that host and guest should be polite to each other and that causes its own strain. There is a wonderful moment when the dinner is brought out in which everyone praises the chicken and then there is a heavy silence in which they are all nervous of returning to more thorny topics. We wonder how many superlatives they can conjure up for the chicken.

There are strong performances throughout. We feel the indignation grow in Estella Daniels’ Charlotte while she remains politely attempting to gauge the couple. But we have been warned that Charlotte has been known to refuse buyers before, so there is a simmering tension in the knowledge the power base is not all one-sided.

Kate Copeland’s Virginia initially appears measured and rational but as the cracks emerge we realise she is, in many ways, a woman on the edge. She brings her grief to the table like an open wound and turns on both her husband and her visitor when angry.

Matthew Pidgeon’s Charles is strong in self-belief, even to the point of sacrificing his own family to his principals, and when challenged by Charlotte refuses to see the validity of her arguments.

The story then moves on a few months to Charles visiting Charlotte in her studio. With just the two face to face, the discussion becomes even more heated and their debate covers a lot of ground. But in doing so this act also loses some of the dry humour of the first and risks becoming too didactic.

Directed by Natalie Ibu, The White Card is a play which will spark debate not least because none of the characters are deliberately malicious. Each begins the narrative believing their actions are morally and socially right - it’s only when forced to re-evaluate that the doubts arise. And in doing so, they will also prompt audience members to ask similar questions of themselves and society generally.

Reviewed by Diane Parkes at The Rep, Birmingham on 8 June. The White Card continues to show at the theatre until Saturday 18 June.