Morning
I met up with an old friend yesterday to go and see Purple Heart by Bruce Norris at the Gate theatre in Notting Hill. I haven't been there for a while.
I did some performances of my one woman show Fallen by Polly Teale at the Gate back in the late eighties. Its a great little space which has always punched above its weight in uncompromising quality and taking risks.
Bruce Norris' play Purple Heart set in 1972 is a gripping and intimate piece of work that takes you right into the interior world of a woman's rage fuelled grief at the loss of her soldier husband in Vietnam.
The smallness of the Gate space invites us closely into the living room in which the entire action takes place over 2 hours. The intimacy is palpable and it draws us into the grief and incidental humour like an emotional surf board. Its simply one of the best plays I have seen in a while. Brian Norris' script is saturated with truth and manages to get in between the cracks of the everyday platitudes and controls that come with the grief rituals. The dialogue is often fast and the interjections build satisfyingly upon each other, broken with monologues that capture authentic attempts to express the inexpressible.
Underneath the demonstrations of admiration such as the awarding of the Purple Heart for bravery to her husband, Carla (Amanda Lowdell) kicks out at life, injustice, brutality and love.
The oppressiveness of her controlling mother-in-law Grace (Linda Broughton) who is just trying to "do her best out of love" is keenly observed and claustrophobic. Carla's son Thor is touchingly played by Oliver Coopersmith whose clarity of performance drew me in throughout.
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One of my favourite moments is a silence which extended beyond the 'norm' within the naturalistic convention. It requires a deftness in the director (Christopher Hayden) to be brazen enough to let an authentic silence hang thick in the air without compromise way beyond its time. I just loved that - Trevor White as the injured serviceman Purdy, sits waiting in the living room for Carla, and he waits and we wait for a good 3 minutes in silence. Its beautiful and true.
This is a truly fine piece of direction and the performances are all outstanding. I highly recommend a trip to see Purple Heart at the Gate before it closes on April 6th.
In the meantime - eat chocolate!
I met up with an old friend yesterday to go and see Purple Heart by Bruce Norris at the Gate theatre in Notting Hill. I haven't been there for a while. I did some performances of my one woman show Fallen by Polly Teale at the Gate back in the late eighties. Its a great little space which has always punched above its weight in uncompromising quality and taking risks.
The smallness of the Gate space invites us closely into the living room in which the entire action takes place over 2 hours. The intimacy is palpable and it draws us into the grief and incidental humour like an emotional surf board. Its simply one of the best plays I have seen in a while. Brian Norris' script is saturated with truth and manages to get in between the cracks of the everyday platitudes and controls that come with the grief rituals. The dialogue is often fast and the interjections build satisfyingly upon each other, broken with monologues that capture authentic attempts to express the inexpressible.
The oppressiveness of her controlling mother-in-law Grace (Linda Broughton) who is just trying to "do her best out of love" is keenly observed and claustrophobic. Carla's son Thor is touchingly played by Oliver Coopersmith whose clarity of performance drew me in throughout.
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In the meantime - eat chocolate!
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