It turns out that a video tape can be medicinal. Standby for Tape Back-Up, a play performed by Ross Sutherland at the Old Fire Station, shows this to be the case. Depressed, bereaved, dealing with the aftermath of a frustrating job, dealing with ongoing problems of asthma and alcoholism, Sutherland describes a need to turn to his past. Old pictures and writings, he explains, help to tether him to himself and to reality.
But as a result of a massive, tragic hard drive crash, none of these old mementos exist. The only thing he has left linking himself to his past – his own life – is an old VHS tape that once belonged to his late granddad. This tape has a healing effect which contextualises identity and memory.
Sutherland integrates the mashed-up excerpts from TV shows and movies like Ghostbusters, Jaws, The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, football matches, The Crystal Maze, an old Nat West ad, the 'Thriller' music video, and many others with performance poetry. What was left on the tape, he explains, tells his life story.
'Every moment of my life, every aspect of my personality,' he says, 'goes back to Ghostbusters.' For Sutherland, dealing with asthma is much like getting over the more frightening aspects of the film at the age of four. It also shaped his relationship with his granddad, the person who first brought him to see the film.
The bank ad provides an insight of his working life; Will Smith's sit-com is a story about dealing with grief and death, and TV generally provides a kind of 'dress rehearsal' for grief. After all, characters on TV frequently die and we are perennially bearing witness.
It's hard to explain the logic of Sutherland as such explanations provide the bulk of his performance. Suffice to say, he relies on the audience relating to that strange feeling of coincidence we get when every song that comes on the radio feels like it relates exactly to our situation, as though it were put there just for us.
Through its pastiche of storytelling and footage, Standby for Tape Back-Up feels like nothing you've seen before. It's both bizarre and thought-provoking, providing a memorable experience which questions the role of pop culture in each of our biographies.
Sutherland is an outstanding performer who knows how to weave a fascinating story. His timing in synchronising his words and the footage is spot on. The effect is unsettling. How can our lives so easily match the television playing in the background?