Imagine you’re in the prime of your life and a big-boned man drops by your office. After introducing himself as “Peter van Rensburg, financial adviser” he sits down to dispense some advice on future investments.
Imagine you’re in the prime of your life and a big-boned man drops by your office. After introducing himself as “Peter van Rensburg, financial adviser” he sits down to dispense some advice on future investments.
He presents you with two options: Massive returns on a risky, aggressive investment, or stable returns on a much safer route.
Watching the stage production Red was like witnessing someone picking option two.
Red was one of four productions performed and directed by Rhodes University drama students at the recent Young Directors' Season 2013. With the focus on the directors, their brief was to “coordinate and manage the performance to the level of a professionally performed event”.
Red was written in 2009 by American playwright John Logan and follows the creative process of abstract expressionist painter Mark Rothko (Philip Sulter) and his often temperamental exchanges with his ambitious assistant, Ken (Keegan van Zyl). “What sold me was the relationship between an old and a young man – the old one’s fear of what’s young and the new,” said director, Jade Manicom.
Against the backdrop of the rise of the far more commercial Warhols and Lichtensteins in the art world, the play addresses Rothko’s intimidation and desperation to stay relevant in a rapidly changing creative arena. “A lot of what is being said in the play is poking at today,” said Manicom.
Hmmm, perhaps the fear that Manicom mentioned in this instance wasn’t coming from the outside but rather, from the inside, on opposite sides of the room.
Let me explain.
In a pivotal scene, Rothko expresses his dismay with the audience observing his latest commission work at the Four Season’s Hotel. “Oh, the agony of commercial success,” I thought. But this shifted my attention to ‘us’, the audience. In reality we’re like Pete, my imaginary financial adviser, wearing advisory name tags but often failing to sell the better option.
We are as much part of the performance and we’re partly to blame for it. Too often, have I been in this type of audience – you know, the shit-I-better-nod-and-agree-that-this-is-deep-or-else-I-won’t-get-invited-next-time type. Four weeks of theatre rehearsal and planning commences. This is where Pete plucks out a pen and slowly points at the dotted line intended for your signature; you can still surprise him and change your mind.
But Manicom’s direction proved otherwise. Although her choices in set design and speech were fair, ironically it did not convey the sense of abandonment that could have been carried by the play’s theme.
The two actors – apart from a few accent technicalities and character inconsistencies (last time I checked, people slur when they're drunk) – gave it their best shot. But it was nothing to write home about. Robert De Niro once said you have to earn the right to play a character – a method I rarely advocate, but in this instance the maturity of the acting material taken on needed exactly that.
It really does come down to the execution of the performance. Right down to the crowd’s feedback, or rather lack thereof.
Because, let’s face it, this usually boils down to something like “So classic” or “I just loved the aesthetics of it – nuance and subtle ambiguity” – hard to argue with such logic. Shoe-string budgets and time constraints aside… a thought: how about an original script for next year’s event?
Surely the talent pool in Grahamstown includes starving (I’d envision quite literally) undiscovered writers, dying to let their freak flag fly and see their work materialise on stage? At this stage of the game, you’ve got nothing to lose.
