Extra!_Extra!_Mime_Review_B_Grantham_Nuit_Sur_Le_Monde_Purcell_Rooms_Southbank_Centre

The London International Mime Festival

NUIT SUR LE MONDE

Presented by Compagnie Mossoux-Bonté (Belgium)

Concept, Direction and Choreography: Nicole Mossoux & Patrick Bonté

Set Designer: Catherine Cosme

Costume Designer: Colette Huchard

Sound & Lighting Designer: Patrick Bonté

Purcell Room

14 - 16 January, 2008

‘Nuit sur le Monde’ is a faultless work; there is not a moment’s lapse of style or taste in it. It is complete in conception and in execution, exact. Nothing is imprecise, nothing under or overplayed, no moment of insincerity, insensitivity or self-consciousness – in my opinion - faultless. Now that doesn’t necessarily mean that everyone is going to like it. I did - at least a large part of it.

Having assured you of the excellence of the form and execution let me try to give you some indication of the content - more difficult this - and it can be no more than a very subjective interpretation. We wait in darkness, a long time it seems, but this is necessary, so that in the dimmest of light we are at last able to discern a more or less human form, emerging from its background like the bas-reliefs on the temples at Luxor, struggling to escape from the red stone wall that imprisons them. Gradually there is movement – minimal movements– as if the soul were first inhabiting its body, a turn or dropping of the head, a stretching of the arms, an expanding of the ribcage, and then a delicious and sensual misaligning of the hip. One female figure is soon joined by another till there are six in all, of which two are male. The sequence stimulates other images from my cultural store: the dark eyed Greco-Roman portraits on embalmed dead; the wall painting of dancing girls from Pompeii (the same Bikini pants and bras!); the altars of Mithras, and the catacombs of the early Christians; the frieze from the Parthenon, and if that be judged beautiful then what we are witnessing on the stage before us is equally so, and for the same reasons.

When after the interval, in the second part of the triptych which forms ‘Nuit sur le Monde’, a female in a high heels and a white bathrobe entered, I was disappointed to lose my frieze of Greco-Roman gods and goddesses and for a time felt much less comfortable with this mortal, of whom there were soon more, identically clad and black bewigged (no, the fellows wore neither wigs nor high heels); these, the inmates of a mad house, are afraid of human contact; connecting and disconnecting, reaching and withdrawing; for a moment joining but quickly withdrawing in fear of committing, so that movements are only half made and then arrested. As the piece continues there were moments of great beauty, exercising considerable skill. Where required, the degree of synchronisation becomes almost cloning and throughout, timing, both dramatic and rhythmic is exemplary. There are also sequences of unmitigated horror of epileptic fits, and the results of insulin injection and electric shock therapy. Where the first item celebrates the glory of the body, this piece demonstrates the paradox of attraction and shame. The dressing gowns alternatively reveal and conceal. The participants cover each other’s naked shame. A single girl is left on-stage to divest herself of her last item of clothing in a move of agony like a primitive birth-giving.

How times have changed. One thinks of some of the first nights given by the Diaghilev Ballet – that ofNijinsky’s brave and innovative ‘L’Aprés Midi d’un Faun’ and the furore it caused. And the riots on the opening of ‘Sacre du Printemps’ and today total nudity is greeted with polite applause. The nudity in ‘Nuit sur le Monde’ is made beautiful by choreography and of an integrity as genuine as that of those earlier pioneers.

The third offering is again one of powerful imagery. Called ‘Alone in the Night’

Yes – who is alone in the night? Us? Them - those strange creatures in pretty party dresses advancing towards us on their knees with, again tiny, this time, pathetic gestures? What are our cultural references for this one?

Now with your permission I am going to introduce you to my wife Joan, dancer and musician, who, as always on my visits to review a production was sitting next to me. Her usual role has been limited to restraining the more outspoken and splenetic rancour of my criticism. But on this occasion I want to tell you that, to her, this last piece was one of great beauty, warmth, and rich colour, recalling a particular medieval religious painting which we have so far been unable to identify. Where as I, found it quite terrifying, my nearest term of reference being the creatures from ‘Night of the Zombies,’ or a painting that haunted my childhood by Author Rackham called ‘The Goblins are Coming’, and on a humorous note - the triplets from the film ‘The Band Wagon’.

Rereading this I want to assure you that this was just an example of the subjective nature of our reception, and in no way meant to detract form the brilliance of the occasion

I cannot and would not single out anyone (except, to praise the lighting by Patrick Bonté, who was also responsible for the entire concept) but let me celebrate the names of the cast who are: Sabastien Jacobs, Leslie Mannès, Ayelen Parolin, Maxence Rey, Candy Saulnier, and Armand Van den Hamer.