Poe and Pinter: Macabre Resurrections and The New World Order – reviews
David Hugh in Macabre Resurrections. Photograph: Frank D J Eriksen-Miller
Every now and then, a piece of theatre arrives which makes the conventional sit-in-the-dark-and-watch fare on offer in the mainstream institutions seem woefully lacklustre in comparison.
Two site-specific theatrical offerings in Hackney this month do just that, tearing down the fourth wall in refreshing and powerful ways.
As part of the Barbican’s bite season, Hydrocracker’s The New World Order moves from its previous incarnation at the Brighton Festival to the stately structure of Shoreditch Town Hall.
The company, who are ‘committed to theatre as an event’, have amalgamated five of Harold Pinter’s later, intensely political, plays, and this material is used as the basis for a thoroughly immersive and painfully realistic tour de force. The resulting experience is such that a traditional review can hardly do it justice – its raw power must ultimately be endured first-hand.
Upon entering the venue, we are accosted by sinister, reflector-clad security officials, who proceed to frisk all entrants in a mildly brusque manner – a sampling of what is to come. Handed a badge which must be worn at all times, we are then greeted by a bureaucrat from the ‘Ministry of Cultural Integrity’ who apologises profusely for the traffic, and ushers us upstairs to attend a press conference by the newly appointed minister.
The play (for want of a more accurate term) then follows, quite literally, the travails of a prisoner of conscience who is being held and tortured by the authoritarian, 1984-esque state, as we are taken on a journey into the recesses of the site, and into the darker elements of this dystopian society.
As we are herded from chamber to chamber, attempts to convince oneself that the whole thing is make-believe become increasingly futile, and genuine fear unwittingly takes hold. In the scenes in which the prisoner is being abused, the desire to intervene becomes overwhelming.
The constant feeling of confinement perfectly complements Pinter’s writing, and even his famed silences are given an edge absent in conventional productions.
Experiments with interactive theatre are often let down by mediocre acting, and the success of this production is largely due to the exceptional cast, who rise to the challenge of performing with an audience, rather than merely for them. The authenticity of their characterisations accounts for a large portion of the play’s brutal realism, particularly that of Hugh Ross as the slithery, serpentine minister and Richard Hahlo as the largely silent prisoner.
In Ross’ mouth, the softly uttered phrase “God speaks through me” sends shivers down your spine, and Hahlo’s pained but resolute expressions are even more chilling to behold.
Mention must also be made of Ellie Jones’ direction, which aside from being a logistical marvel – the 80 minute experience is entirely seamless – manages to create an atmosphere in which even the most cynical of spectators become increasingly and irreparably unsettled. As we watch the barbarous subjugation of the innocent individuals in the play, associations with human rights abuses both contemporary and historical are hard to ward off – yet another reason to put this production on the top of your ‘must see’ list.
St. Mary’s Old Church, an ancient edifice halfway down Stoke Newington Church Street surrounded by an eerie graveyard, is the suitably gothic venue for Second Skin Theatre’s adaptation of Edgar Allen Poe’s macabre stories.
Fresh from their success with a production of Mario Vargas Llosa’s La Chunga, which transfers to a West End stage in January, the company reinvent six of the master of horror’s morbid tales, utilising every crevice of the church in which Poe, who was schooled on Church Street, may well have worshipped as a youth.
The audience are ushered into the pews, and the ‘service’ begins with an edifying sermon from the pulpit by Stephen Connery Brown, whose smug, alcoholic preacher is delightful enough to warrant a show of his own. His ‘flawed man of the cloth’ act re-emerges throughout the evening, seamlessly linking the six separate stories.
Each of the adaptations approaches Poe’s texts in a unique way. The Preacher and the Raven takes a rather straightforward route, delivering a haunting reading of the original narrative poem, which reverberates around the nave, while The Cask of Amontillado is reduced to an entertaining, if rather trivial romp. The Black Cat, in which the narrator is changed to a woman, is notable for an admirable solo performance by local actor Mia Zara, who is compelling in her lengthy monologue as the deranged yet calculating villain.
The most novel reimaginings are Premature Burial and The Pit and the Pendulum, both of which have been updated to modern scenarios, the former tackling the war in Afghanistan, and the latter swapping the Spanish Inquisition for an illegal US detainment camp.
The audience are shepherded to the ghostly graveyard to witness the eponymous burial in the first of these stories, which is a tremendously atmospheric event, even if not as petrifying as one might expect.
If there is a failing in this adventurous production, it is that the nuances of Poe’s original works are somewhat lost in the spectacle. That said, despite the sensational nature of the staging, the overwhelming notion is that hell is not ethereal, and is ultimately a human construct: as one character, pointing to his head, puts it, “there is no tomb except up here”.
The performance ends with The Masque of the Red Death, which is turned into more of a visual extravaganza than a drama, and is the most terrifying of all the segments. As we shuffle out of this iconic building past plaques which have been hanging, in some instances, for almost a millennium, this energetic and gutsy production seems a fitting addition to its extraordinary and colourful history.
The New World Order by Harold Pinter
16 November – 11 December
Shoreditch Town Hall
Poe: Macabre Resurrections
16 November – 4 December 2011
St. Mary’s Old Church
Stoke Newington