THE DISSECTION of mental anguish, depression and suicide is always going to be a tough watch, but in this timely revival of Sarah Kane’s millennial script it’s an experience as compelling as it is unsettling, as rewarding as it is upsetting.
Three unnamed performers deliver thoughts, confessions and insights as people suffering the deepest of depressions, taking turns to slip effortlessly between patient and doctor. Their comments and experiences are harrowing but never sentimental.
With no clear narrative save the steady, inexorable progression toward the crushingly desperate outcome, this is seventy minutes of concentrated exploration of the darkest parts of the human psyche.
In an interesting move the entire cast and creative team from the original production in 2000 have been reunited to bring the piece back to the stage.
Performers Jo McInnes, Madeleine Potter and Daniel Evans all give everything to this production second time around. Physically and emotionally this is a tour de force for all three. From strung-out to chillingly calm, from the bleakest depths to snatches of sparkling gallows humour, there’s not a single misplaced moment.
Director James Macdonald gathers everything with commendable crispness and focus.
Jeremy Herbert’s design acts as almost a fourth member of the cast. A stark stage with equally uninviting table and chairs is, by means of a stage-width angled mirror, sent soaring as a background too with those lying on the floor now suspended in space right in front of us.
Add in adventurous lighting, spot video projections and surfaces which get written on and we’re examining these people and their personal hell from every conceivable angle.
But it’s through the scope and power of the words that we examine them most closely. In many respects Kane’s work comes across more like a poetry collection. Rhythmic, condensed, repetitious and startling, these lines would make a fine book. But the choice of stage rather than page is what makes this piece so persuasive. It’s a visual poem, a verbal ballet and packs all the greater punch for being brief and uninterrupted.
