Review: Wittenberg

Wittenberg
Red Stitch Actors Theatre
6 October 2012
Red Stitch
to 3 November
redstitch.net

Hamlet, philosophy, temptation, indulgences (the paid for kind), Banksy rats, coffee and the quill. Welcome to Wittenberg, Germany, 1517, and Red Stitch, St Kilda, 2012.

Here a young Danish prince, who looks like he's stepped out of Brideshead Revisited, discusses life (or not), the universe and salvation with his university professors John Faustus and Martin Luther, who, despite the odd disagreement, are best mates who regularly enjoy a tankard together.

Sub-titled as a tragical-comical-historical in two acts, David Davalos's 2008 play is a post-modern-ish mash up of philosophy, literature, university politics and the Protestant Reformation. What more do you need to know!?

If you think it sounds like it's written by a nerdy clever dick who's read far too many books, you're spot on. This is the kind of play that justifies doing philosophy at uni, reading old plays and getting As for history in high school. So if you're a nerdy clever dick with a few spare degrees, this is wrtten for you – and you'll still miss some of the jokes because you'll still be laughing from the last barrage of witty wordplay and literary lampooning.

If you're not? Don't worry because Wittenberg is so damn funny that you'll feel like you know it all anyway.

It's similar to Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (enjoyable without knowing Hamlet – but it helps if you do),  but far broader and more contemporary. But it helps if you know Hamlet and at least one of the Dr Fs. Or there's this study guide from the premier production by Philadelphia's Arden Theatre Company.

In the wrong hands, Wittenberg could be an obnoxious self-important bore of play, but director Jane Montgomery Griffiths ensures that the humour's as base as Luther's thank-you-god poo and banishes any hints of academic stuffiness – and still makes a 'publish or perish' joke work.

Ezra Bix (Faustus), Josh Price (Luther), Brett Ludeman (Hamlet) and Olga Makeeva (the chicks) are simply hilarious. Their grand, historic and tragic characters are anything by grand, historic or tragic. Hamlet's a bit thick and anxious but full of hope, Luther doesn't know what reformation means, and Faustus is reasonably content and has a regular gig singing at the local tavern. It's a bit like hearing the Queen fart; no pomp, ceremony or memorial tea set can restore the grandeur and they're far more loveable for being seen as human.

This was on AussieTheatre.com


Photo by Jodie Hutchinson

Someone Who’ll Watch Over Me

Someone Who’ll Watch Over Me
West East Theatre
10 May 2009
fortyfive downstairs

An American, an Irishman and an Englishman walk into Beirut and find themselves locked in cell together for four and a half years.

Based on real events, Someone Who’ll Watch Over Me is the premiere production of West East Theatre, formed by Trent Baker and Richard Stables. This internationally awarded work by Irish dramatist Frank McGuinness is an obvious choice for actors wanting something hearty to grow facial hair for and, at nearly three hours, this piece of black, gritty realism is an actor’s dream script – but, as a watcher, I felt left out.

Someone Who’ll Watch Over Me explores how Adam (Stables), Edward (Baker) and Michael (Ezra Bix) survive their brutal incarceration. The cellar-like atmosphere of fortyfive downstairs is the perfect venue to create a sense of dank claustrophobia, so I wonder why the design made the place look so big and airy. It’s hard to feel their lack of space when the windows behind them make the cell look endless and the wall of light is a joke once it’s broken. As the cell felt too big, the captors lacked threat. There wasn’t a sense of “them” – their abductors – and the work could just as easily have been three blokes stuck in a cellar waiting for the zombies or the aliens to move away from the door.

I want to know why this was a story for me. I’m aware that I’m not a middle-aged man locked away, but this is a work that freely explores abandonment, frustration, boredom, hatred, family, love, friendship, freedom and loyalty – all of which are for me – and everyone else. The interpretation seemed so caught up in being real, that the big picture, the universality, was missing. The direction and performances seemed to concentrate on the micro of each scene, even each line, so that that the macro was lost. It didn’t take long to be able to predict the earnest hand gestures, the conscious pace and rhythm, or the moment when a performer would actively look away – because he’d stared too long at another actor and that wasn’t natural.

Each scene was so meticulously created, that it lessened the impact of the work as a whole. When music was unexpectedly used to underline emotion, it distracted from the emotion, as it had no place in the world already created for us and had not been established as part of the language. The night seemed so much about the performances, that the story was secondary. Even if they were the greatest performances ever; if we’re just admiring actors, rather than watching characters we care about and being drawn into their world – what is the point?

This review originally appeared on AussieTheatre.com.