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In Company Theatre and Brockley Jack Theatre present
The Woman Before
Written by Roland Schimmelpfennig
Directed by Juliane von Sivers
Brockley Jack Theatre
10-21 November 2009
A review by Chad Armitstead for EXTRA! EXTRA!
Juliane von Sivers and her cast invite you in, lock the door and light the fuse. In this short, explosive drama, Frank (Phillip Allinson) and his wife Claudia (Anne Bird) are packing the last few boxes while the rest of their life and flat is already in a container on its way across the ocean. The night before they emigrate with their son Andi (Gary Buckley), Romy Vogtländer shows up to enforce Frank’s promise to love her forever, made 24 years ago when he was 19. She doesn’t want to settle for anything less than Frank completely renouncing his son and 20 plus years of marriage. Schimmelpfennig’s (writer) show is claustrophobic in time, space and emotion. Before it begins, director Juliane von Sivers puts the audience into the space, where the family’s life is already happening. Claudia’s brushing her teeth. Frank’s packing records. Andi’s at his girlfriend Tina’s house (in the audience). Romy waits outside the door. The drama rapidly unfolds, entangles and explodes inches from the audience. It’s the killer whale hunting the baby seal from which you just can’t look away. Mostly bare stage with a few boxes, von Sivers puts focus on the action that springs shut on the characters with the impartial certainty of a bear trap. Under her direction, Schimmelpfennig’s script holds audiences in its chilling thrall from Romy’s first rap on Frank’s door to the last light bulb’s acquiescent ‘pop.’ Breaking from non-linear narrative, the showtinkers with time, which Schimmelpfennig uses to interesting effect. Writer and director show us part of a scene, usually the climax, then the bare bulbs pop and go black, re-igniting to show the events before and/or after the scene fragment. It’s something like seeing a firecracker go off, then seeing it again intact, fuse burning toward the explosion we know is coming—or like seeing a car wreck, then watching the impact and the moments before and after it in slow motion. In doing this, Schimmelpfennig ratchets up the already blistering pace and adds dramatic irony to the scenes that on first blush appear banal. The second versions of the scenes often expose the characters’ self-deception or outright lying. The bare-stage, audience-aware direction and design suit this kind of storytelling. Hanging just one or two undependable bare bulbs that appear to light the action, von Sivers, Sky Bembury (lighting design) and Cara Newman (designer) underline the nature of theatre, storytelling and human beings: though they speak directly to us, they don’t necessarily tell us the truth. They reveal only what they choose to shine light upon. Emily Meadows’ electricity run-amok soundtrack hones the effect to a pinpoint. Putting Andi and his girlfriend Tina (Charlotte Powell) in the audience, von Sivers further highlights the fact that no character or audience member knows the whole story at any given time. And certainly no one knows what the characters are capable of. The cast gives appropriately chilling performances. Charlotte Powell makes a surprisingly warm and sympathetic connection with the audience as Tina, given the bleak landscape of the script. I didn’t leave feeling the weight of an earth-shattering, progressive message. The Woman Before seems more concerned with taut drama and challenging the narrative form. It succeeds in those aims, making it a claustrophobic, visceral gem. I did however leave feeling like the story would bear more exploration of the characters and the issues they were facing. I kept expecting Claudia to incite a showdown, confronting Frank’s waffling in the face of her years of work and sacrifice. I would have gladly watched another half an hour of character explorations like this one. With that said, less is better than too much. I would rather have a dramatist give me an hour of what speaks to me than three hours of what he thinks I need. Director, cast and creatives have put this explosive drama on a short fuse.They make it hard to look away from the creeping glow burning across the darkness.
£10, £8 concessions Box office: 0844 847 2454
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ary Couzens