By Not Yet It's Difficult
IRAA 14 Lowther St.
Alphington until June 8, 1996
Reviewed by Kate Herbert around June 2, 1966
It is peculiar that
Anglophiles have elevated a very dead white male, notwithstanding his
exceptional talent, to the status of a god. William Shakespeare: Hung,
Drawn and Quartered diffuses the hype and histrionics which surround the man who
became a legend after his own time.
Director, David Pledger's company, Not Yet It's Difficult,
creates experimental, non-narrative theatre with passion, physicality,
complicity and irreverence at its centre. WSHDQ is no exception. Its five
performers (Maud Davey, Paul Bongiovanni, Kha Tran Viet, Danielle Long, Greg
Ulfan) weave a tapestry of images throughout an empty space while we, the
observers-participants stand, crouch, sit and follow them about.
WSDHQ shatters the barriers between audience and performer
by addressing us directly, working close to us, moving us around the space. It
plays roughly recorded Vox Pops of people talking about Will. It eliminates the
transporting nature of most conventional theatre by interrupting the flow to
introduce all the artists, even those who are not present. They forego the
silly convention of a box-office in the
foyer by selling tickets in the space as actors prepare for the performance.
The tickets themselves are pages ripped irreverently from your favourite
Shakespeare. Wicked!
WSHDQ bridges the gap between director and performance.
Pledger is amongst the audience then onstage. His ironic political diatribe is
followed by an evangelical tirade about Shakespeare being the way to faith,
hope and joy in a godless world.
Shakespeare has become precious as gold - or god. His work
has fostered idolatry, superiority, Anglophilia, vanity and sneering at those
who do not appreciate him. The company does beautifully rendered excerpts from
several plays but it ridicules the obsessive, almost patriarchal dominance of
his work in literary and theatrical circles. They mock-masturbate, kiss, fawn
and prostrate themselves to the work. "Shakespeare invented English.
Shakespeare invented Violence. Shakespeare invented The Exit."
One frighteningly accurate scene was the torture of an
auditionee who does not understand iambic pentameter or any other poetic
rhythmic elements of the verse. He is beaten with a volume of complete works.
It is a Police State which governs our literary taste and values.
KATE HERBERTˆ
347 wds
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