T.S. Eliot’s name appended to the title – that’s why I came. Is that pretentious? Well…I know little about him and I wanted to know more. Modernism, spiritual crises – that’s him isn’t it? “You betta tell me more!” I thought. And the programme does: ‘a thing inspired by T.S. Eliot: a thing about urban experience.’ That it? And yet, in hindsight, the inventive splurge concocted from a reviewer’s swollen vocabulary, and pride, could not define this play any more accurately. It’s ‘a thing’. Not a five-act play, not a comedy, tragedy, tragi-comedy. Just a thing.
And the actors on stage for this thing are kids – Fifteen? Sixteen? - and the effort of these nine kids is impressive- three amongst them (I don’t know their names) are truly talented actors – yet it’s the evident togetherness of the cast that drives the piece. And We Drown depicts a modern wasteland with the young cast playing beggars, drunkards, whores, stiffs in suits, lovers, the everyman and the nobody. Mist obscures the audience’s vision whilst detritus of everyday existence is the limit of the scenery (traffic cones, sign posts, trolleys – the hoardings of a student night out?).
And We Drown is about the eddy and swirl of life in modern society, and Eliot’s modernist poems are no less contemporary than they ever were. There is no plot, and these are not sketches; yet Director Oscar Wood has done a fantastic job of updating Eliot’s verbal presentiment of urban disorientation, through means of IPods and coffeehouse culture. Singing one’s own IPod tune, drowning others out, others’ out; packed like sardines in a train, yet drowning in a common movement; submerged behind one’s newspaper, unwilling to swim freely into the world – Eliot’s words are the inspiration, yet the intelligence of this “thing” relies in Wood’s great ideas for physical theatre.
It is an impressionistic effect then that is sought after. Most of the performance involves ensemble acting of what seem to be very loosely devised or improvised lines. And this is bold. Rare is it for a performance in Oxford to step outside the perimeters of Wilde wordplay and into that of de Coq subtlety. And We Drown is a wonderful demonstration of the richness of theatre. And yet, what’s the point in this kaleidoscopic bleakness? Brilliantly appropriate music attunes and accompanies the mood throughout, and yet, why this pitching from escalator music blandness to Dionysian frenzy?
The point is that the audience experiences a strongly sensuous experience. We are shown what is going on beneath the vestments of society’s functions. And what is going on is that people are drowning.
The play is performed by children, but their ingenuous acting, sometimes sloppily-timed manoeuvres, or overly-characterized accents perhaps make it all the more painful to see them ‘drowning’. The kids that have it all to come: all the joy and suffering of trying to stay afloat in a modern Wasteland.
And the actors on stage for this thing are kids – Fifteen? Sixteen? - and the effort of these nine kids is impressive- three amongst them (I don’t know their names) are truly talented actors – yet it’s the evident togetherness of the cast that drives the piece. And We Drown depicts a modern wasteland with the young cast playing beggars, drunkards, whores, stiffs in suits, lovers, the everyman and the nobody. Mist obscures the audience’s vision whilst detritus of everyday existence is the limit of the scenery (traffic cones, sign posts, trolleys – the hoardings of a student night out?).
And We Drown is about the eddy and swirl of life in modern society, and Eliot’s modernist poems are no less contemporary than they ever were. There is no plot, and these are not sketches; yet Director Oscar Wood has done a fantastic job of updating Eliot’s verbal presentiment of urban disorientation, through means of IPods and coffeehouse culture. Singing one’s own IPod tune, drowning others out, others’ out; packed like sardines in a train, yet drowning in a common movement; submerged behind one’s newspaper, unwilling to swim freely into the world – Eliot’s words are the inspiration, yet the intelligence of this “thing” relies in Wood’s great ideas for physical theatre.
It is an impressionistic effect then that is sought after. Most of the performance involves ensemble acting of what seem to be very loosely devised or improvised lines. And this is bold. Rare is it for a performance in Oxford to step outside the perimeters of Wilde wordplay and into that of de Coq subtlety. And We Drown is a wonderful demonstration of the richness of theatre. And yet, what’s the point in this kaleidoscopic bleakness? Brilliantly appropriate music attunes and accompanies the mood throughout, and yet, why this pitching from escalator music blandness to Dionysian frenzy?
The point is that the audience experiences a strongly sensuous experience. We are shown what is going on beneath the vestments of society’s functions. And what is going on is that people are drowning.
The play is performed by children, but their ingenuous acting, sometimes sloppily-timed manoeuvres, or overly-characterized accents perhaps make it all the more painful to see them ‘drowning’. The kids that have it all to come: all the joy and suffering of trying to stay afloat in a modern Wasteland.