The Trial – Kafka’s play comes to Hackney
Nearly one hundred years after Franz Kafka wrote The Trial, an adaptation by a local theatre company aims to show the novel’s relevance to modern audiences in the internet age.
In an unorthodox staging, audiences go on foot through East London in pursuit of Joseph K, a man arrested and prosecuted for unknown reasons.
Performed in two parts in multiple venues, audience members become embroiled in Joseph’s fate through a series of encounters with individual characters.
“With Kafka it’s always about an individual battling against a system so we wanted to make it a one-on-one experience,” explains director Felix Mortimer.
“The strength of putting it in a few different locations and for them to be real locations is a kind of veracity and truth – it makes the play exist in real life.”
In the novel, Joseph visits several people, including his uncle, a lawyer, a painter and a priest. The staged version, which boasts a 40-strong cast, sees individual audience members having similar encounters.
At the end of part one at Shoreditch Town Hall, the audience can choose to attend the trial itself, which takes place at The Rose Lipman Building in April, in an atmosphere inspired by Kafka’s short story ‘In The Penal Colony’.
By updating Kafka’s view that information is power, the production seeks to make a bold statement about the value and preservation of identity in the internet era.
“Because of the internet, this all pervasive system that surrounds us, I think Kafka would be having a field day if he lived now,” says Mortimer. “Individuals like Bradley Manning and Gary Mckinnon are trying to battle against a huge system. Just like Joseph K, these individuals are being persecuted by unknown forces. And just like Joseph, no one really understands why.”
Part One of The Trial is at Shoreditch Town Hall until 27 April and Part Two at The Rose Lipman Building from 2 – 27 April.
Shoreditch Town Hall, 380 Old Street, EC1V 9LT
The Rose Lipman Building, 43 De Beauvoir Road N1 5SQ
retz.co.uk