|
The Barbican Theatre presents Panic
Photo by Keith Pattison by Phelim McDermott and Improbable
Co-directed by Julian Crouch and Lee Simpson
Music, composition and sound by Nick Powell
Video Design by Lysander Ashton
Lighting by Colin Grenfell
Barbican Pit
15 April – 16 May 2009
I
A review by Marion Drew for EXTRA! EXTRA!
Pan is the god of many things, we learn in this production, of bees, of rape, of rustic music, is there anything he hasn’t been co-opted into? And whatever else he is, there is an engaging mischievousness that underlies everything he does. However, this is not all light rustic revelry, there’s a dark undertone, with this rogue, never far from the surface. We follow him as he makes various manifestations and appearances in a rag-bag collection of scenes and circumstances: in the lives of mortals; in strange dreams; in bouts of illnesses; in improbable encounters in forests and in libraries; as a goat-god; as a man and as a gritty little papier-mâché puppet.
Photo by Keith Pattison
Played by Phelim McDermott, he’s fascinating and repulsive, self concerned yet deceptively erudite, funny and yet somehow menacing, a pathetic, ridiculous figure, one minute trying to control his overblown erection, the next plagued by disease and obsessed with self help. There’s a melancholy side too in his quest for some kind of coherence, which in this production he’ll never find And as for his nymphs, (Angela Clerkin, Lucy Foster and Matilda Leyser) well they are far from being indolent ladies of leisure, unsuspecting damsels or innocent virginal pretty things. These are gleeful impish women, feisty ladies, prone to a bit of mischief themselves. The evening has a dreamlike quality to it, chaotic, disorientating, dazzling and dysfunctional, a clever combination of down-to-earth direct engagement with the audience in the stand-up tradition, and dramatic story-telling, and for most of the time it works well. And it is all done in what feels like a paper world, is Pan the God of paper too? Nick Powell's intriguing live music, which slips in and around the cavorting, frisking and agonising like quick silver, only adds to the dreamlike sense of wonderment, confusion, mayhem and at times, of course … downright panic.
Photo by Keith Pattison
The Pit Performances: 19:45/14:30 (25th April; 9th and 16th May) Tickets: £15 BOX OFFICE 0845 120 7554
Copyright © EXTRA! EXTRA All rights reserved
|
zens 
