This play depicting dementia came with very strong reviews from a run in Bath last year.
It is very cleverly written and staged and the acting, particularly by Kenneth Cranham, was excellent. The play evokes the confusion of dementia with discontinuity in the shifting scenes and actors so that the audience, like the main character, hardly knows where they are or who they are with. The play convincingly portrays the unintentional cruelty by the demented - he continually compares the caring daughter to her much preferred but presumably dead sister. It also conveyed the unintended humour in the condition - he is convinced his watch has been stolen, when he has actually hidden it.
This was a play to make one think and count one's fortune. I was particularly struck by how dementia could be seen partly as a role - and one over which the script has quite general consensus. Of course, it is not all a matter of playing a part but I wonder if the existence of the role helps nudge people down the path of disengagement with the 'normal' world.
The stage hands are also worthy of special mention with the room gradually emptied of contents as we stared at the blank space, listening to fractured piano music, as one scene gave way to the next. Each time this came as a shock to me, it having been done most quietly and in apparent darkness.
No comments:
Post a Comment