Being streamed online as part of this year's International Online Theatre Festival, I knew nothing of either the author of this play, Jeton Neziraj, nor of the company performing it, The City Garage Theatre in Santa Monica, California.
So let's first look at the play itself. Written in 2017/8 and receiving its World Premiere performance at this theatre in 2019, it is a dystopian futuristic play, described by the author as "a play that dreams of becoming a comedy". Neziraj is a Kosovan who has lived through the Milosevich bloodbaths in the Balkans to see his area, Kosovo, go on to fight for their independence and recognition as a country in their own right. An honour which is still disputed by some countries, especially Serbia, but it is fair to say that Naziraj has seen and lived through more than his fair share of totalitarianistic war-lord slaughter and political control. One can easily understand why then, he would want to write a play that warns you of the dangers of such a society, one that purports to be doing things 'for the good and safety' of their citiziens. It is advertised as a comedy, although in truth it really isn't. It has moments of humour in it, but it is essentially quite a dark drama. It is also a fantasy. And I was very disappointed by a 'cop-out' ending. I'll not give it away but it did seem that the author decided against his gut and went for a crowd-pleasing bums-on-seats kind of ending instead. As for the dystopian future element of the play. It has been described as 'Orwellian'. A very easy and all-too-often used adjective these days to ascribe to anything that has even a vague whiff of a nihilistic future. Here however, the parallels are much clearer. Both Ben, our protagonist in this play, and Winston, his counterpart in George Orwell's 1984, have mundane office jobs, working for the 'Ministry'. They are both at odds with the system, they both believe there is a better life outside of total control, and they both meet women who excite them, and it is that love of sexual freedom and illicitness which ultimately betrays them to the system and brings about their downfall. There is also a 'Big Brother Is Watching You' feel to this play too, as it concerns the gathering, monitoring and controlling of people's dreams. However, Orwell this play isn't, not by a long way, sadly, but there are some nice ideas and themes which are present. Sadly, the author's insistence on 'keeping it light' marrs the whole. There have been many much better 'lighter' dystopian writings, even Ben Elton's 'Blind Faith' is a much more proficient and cleverly constructed 'light' dystopian future read. Sadly the play has nothing new to say, and therefore ultimately lost my interest very early on.
My biggest problem was with Dan - our protagonist and anti-hero. Unlike Winston, who truly fights against the system with his every fibre, Dan is far too passive, unemotional and uncaring. We really can't see him as being the hero of the common man wanting to smash the system. He is, as it turns out, actually an integral part of the system. Even his subplot, that of his love for Night (a mysterious actress who wanders the Ministry) is very bland and blank.
And what of the theatre company, City Garage Theater. They are either a low budget small-scale Fringe Theatre company or an amateur company, that much is clear. A very basic set on a small studio stage with the use of a screen behind with projections. [if I see just one more play that uses a rear screen on stage I think I will commit murder! Can we please get past this now? It was new and inventive 20 odd years ago... and every single play with every single company now has to use one! Agh!] The acting in general was quite monodimensional and little thought had been given to through-lines and character arcs. There seemed to be no connectivity or chemistry between the actors (even Dan and Night), and the pace the director set for this play was pedestrian at best. I am aware that the nature of the play may not have allowed for much in the way of 'realism'. However, how is an audience member meant to relate to or emote with characters that don't give the audience anything for it to be returned? It is a surreal play, that's true, and of course the whole thing might well have been a dream.. a dream within a dream, or even a dream caught by the Dreambuilder, to dream a dream which makes this a dream. But it wasn't, although that might have proven to be a more interesting idea.
Reviewer - Matthew Dougall
on - 4/5/20
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