Powerful stuff. The shift from the first section to the second, when the realistic (if touched by unexplained elements, especially the ambiguity of the setting and whether Ian's fears are justified) register of the first section with Ian and Cate in the hotel room transitions to a more stylised and overtly symbolic mode, was spot-on, as the intimate violence of Ian's behaviour towards Cate is echoed and amplified through the soldier's actions and the destruction around them, as things devolve ever further - there were not one nor even two but three times when I thought 'surely it's not going there' and the play immediately did (the second-section rape, the eyes, the baby's unearthing) - increasingly what was on stage felt like something from the realm of the unconscious, an experience that theatre is uniquely able to generate. At various times it reminded me of mother!, Beckett and the Michael Kantor Woyzeck from several years back. (This one directed by Anne-Louise Sarks.)
(w/ R)
(w/ R)
