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Fringe 2005 Reviews (27)
Lifeline
Matilda Leyser
Aurora Nova@St Stephens
***
I love this relatively new genre combining circus skills with fiction
in performance. Lifeline is an aerial dance spanning the life
of a woman in just 25 minutes. The rope is literally the lifeline from
the moment Leyser slips in foetal position downwards into birth and
being. This is a beautiful opening moment, and the rope is used well
in other places, not least when the little girl cheekily pretends it
is her penis. The secret of this type of performance lies in the performer's
capacity to engage our imagination for the collaborative process that
transforms one thing into another.
Lifeline is a very short piece and should be regarded as a stage
in Leyser's development towards a larger scale undertaking. Perhaps
it should be billed as 'work-in-progress'. The music was used in a rudimentary
fashion, and with performance of this nature one needs a strong blend
of media to convey meaning and mood if one is to achieve a rich texture
and significant experience for the audience. She has recently been awarded
Arts' Council funding to develop a full-length solo show entitled Line,
Point, Plane in collaboration with experienced practitioners from
the world of theatre and dance. So, I believe we can expect greater
things from her in the future.
I have certainly seen much more imaginative use of circus skills, and
while she is experimenting to find her own style she is not yet in the
league of some of her illustrious colleagues such as Company F/Z who
have their own show at the Pleasance.
Jackie Fletcher
Doublethink
Rotozaza
AuroraNova@St Stephen's
***(*)
This is the type of experimental performance that is mostly seen in
the UK from the excellent Forced Entertainment and it is not to everyone's
taste. If you like your theatre to come wrapped neatly in a realistic
narrative with a beginning, a middle and an end, along with recognisable
characters ripe for empathy, then this is not your cup of tea. If, on
the other hand, you like an element of danger and a large measure of
perplexity mixed up with a dose of passion then you might give this
one a try, especially if you're ready to have your understanding of
the parameters of performance and its fictional world challenged. The
work of Rotozaza raises questions about the nature of the 'truthfulness'
we have come to expect as a part and parcel of an actor's job. Creating
a role, as Stanislavsi would have put it, is a search for the underlying
psychological truth of every thought and action, every minute gesture
brought to spontaneity by the character's motivated impulses. Rotozaza
turns all this on its head.
It's difficult to write about Doublethink without giving away too much.
The sense of risk works best when one is asking oneself if they are
actually being honest about this experiment, or are they having us on,
which is, after all, essential to the nature of fiction and the audience's
willingness to suspend disbelief. In Doublethink, two of the
performers change each day. According to the blurb, the guest performers
have agreed to carry out any instructions given to them entirely unrehearsed
while they stand there on the stage like innocent guinea pigs but are
otherwise entirely in the dark. And one shouldn't underestimate our
own reactions to these schmucks, our darker natures are satisfied by
a sense of superiority and our desire to see them made ridiculous. They
are all alone out there, candidates for embarrassment, something perhaps
we British fear, and they can't even see each other across a dividing
tarpaulin. They are given instructions by a voice over, then increasingly
by whispers and gestures as the two 'genuine' performers start to run
amok.
Doublethink seems to have a stronger fictional framework than
some of Rotozaza's previous work, such as Oomph, which worked
a treat in a 'found space' at Hoxton Hall. But to me that bewildering
and often humorous sense of the arbitrary nature of the shows seemed
stronger in Doublethink because it was juxtaposed to this set
fictional framework. Neil Bennun and Silvia Mercuriali, the regular
participants, are compelling performers, sinister and self-centred,
and their manic passions, spiralling out of control, are delicious to
behold. This one, unlike Oomph, rather makes me want to go back
again to see how much is different with other guests and their spontaneous
reactions. If you feel like questioning the nature of truth, either
on the superficial level of fiction, or by a deeper metaphysical analogy,
you should give this one a whirl.
Jackie Fletcher
Pillar Talk/Slapdash
By Edward Petherbridge
Pleasance Dome
***
Edward Petherbridge is an acting institution who is currently celebrating
his Golden Jubilee on stage. His latest venture is the ultimate one-man
show since he is writer, director, actor, roadie, publicist, indeed
everything apart from the audience.
His dress is impressive, a suit that should have been designed by Jackson
Pollock and sets off a Monet backdrop artistically. He was presumably
costume designer too.
Petherbridge is inevitably a multi-talented man but might have benefited
from a little directorial assistance. The veteran's delivery is relaxed
to the point where both he and we almost forget that he has a play to
get through.
In fact, in the performance reviewed, the first part was a meander
through the life of an actor, rendered in Petherbridge's beautifully
modulated voice. Along the way, he also delivered a poem, Slapdash,
which he informed us more regularly closes the performance.
With a keen eye on the clock, he eventually led us into the more serious
business of the afternoon. This was a one-man play about Simeon Stylites,
the Saint who spent 36 years on top of a pillar.
Even during Pillar Talk, the actor never lost sight of his profession
and was happy to slip out of character to deliver asides, in one case
helped by a theatregoer who slipped into and out of the wrong show.
The tale of the hermit and the men who come to visit him says almost
as much about the play's actor/writer as it does about its ostensible
subject.
This is a nice opportunity to see a master craftsman at work while
learning a little about a fascinating biblical oddity.
Philip Fisher
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