Review of Blackout

The play that we studied this term (Blackout) is a cleverly written monologue or stream of consciousness that can easily be adapted into different styles to suit the performers of the piece. They play itself could be easily be read in under 10 minutes but the physical theatre style of the piece helped the actors to stretch it out into a 25 minute long show. I am going to be reviewing the style of the way they have chosen to interpret the text.

The theatrical configuration it was performed in was thrust. Now in my opinion I thought that it wasn't the wisest of choices to go with because the actors may have ran into complications during the devising process as the would have to be careful that they were using all the stage space and were not cutting off parts of the audience. I was also sceptical that it work would work for a physical theatre piece but low and behold they managed to use having a wide spread audience to their advantage. The movements and vocalisation was only enhanced by this theatrical configuration and were not lost to the space. Speaking of space the way in which spatial relationships were shown were very interesting. Usually we find that if the space between actors is closed off then the tension is ruined and the chase of the scene in ends, but with Blackout I felt that they managed to break this rule especially within the scenes that contain James and his mother!

The chorus work had obviously had some serious work put behind it. The ensemble of actors had such a close and intimate rapport with each other managing  to simultaneously by one single person on their own in a sea full of people but switch to interacting with each other becomes different characters entirely.  This use of multiple roles made the transitions so much more smoother as we did not have to see the curtain to come down to see now that different people were playing different characters. The way in which the actors pushed the concentration through the floor as they moved was phenomenal. It was like they feared if they were to drop the energy then world would end. Though indeed there were some lulls were the energy did drop which was hopefully to be refined at a later day they managed to pick it back up again by feeding off each other's creative energy.

The minimalistic qualities of this play had good and bad points. There was only one prop used through out the entire piece and that was a single ring that was tossed away. I feel as if they should not have used it due to the fact they used no other props. If they had taken a different approach and had at least 3 other symbolic props then it would have been totally fine to use it however since it was just the ring being used it drew to much attention. I do feel though that the use of the actors as props gave them more of a chance to fine creative ways in which to interpret the text into movement. The regular show lighting was not used which meant that the simple harsh lighting made me as an audience member feel inclusive in the story on stage and that the bright scorning lights revealing all were being shown on me too.

Aristotle's 3 unities of acting were completely thrown out of the window. The way in which no time was established so the piece was able to easily cut between events without explanation and not end up in confusion. There was no definitive place that was set in stone so the actors were able to freely use the space. There was no "stage right means the jail and cell and centre is James' mind" it was nice to see them break conventions like this. The action is one big mash up of past, present, future, imagination making it interesting and exiting.

The whole show felt like it had a lot of work put into it moreover the message spoke out clearly to me and I am very impressed with the hard work and commitment of these young people.