Posted by kluster on September 28, 2010
Photo by Jeff Busby
I have a strange relationship with the theatre. I enjoy watching most performances more that I do taking in a film but, despite what many of my peers might think, that is not where the strangeness lies. There is something so incredibly beguiling about an actor putting themselves out there, in the flesh, night after night. I find myself inextricably drawn to it. Still, I would not class that as overly unusual. No, the strangeness in the aforementioned relationship comes from the fact it almost always takes me a minimum of 20 minutes to slot into what I have casually dubbed ‘theatre mode’: to become used to the exaggerated gestures and at-times verbose deliveries. I have never been able to figure out why and was yet to find a production where this was not the case.
That is, before watching Sydney Theatre Company’s, The Trial. This meaty production, recently adapted by Louise Fox from the Franz Kafka novel of the same name and directed by Matthew Lutton, is engaging from the first moment.
From the outset audiences are exposed to the seemingly simplistic life of Josef K (Ewen Leslie) as it spirals out of all control and conventional comprehension. Here is a man charged for an undisclosed crime and brought to appear before an unknown court. The more he seeks answers the further he becomes embroiled in faceless mystification.
The performances are bold and dedicated. The cast of seven drags the audience through a quagmire of human concerns including the fruitlessness of bureaucracy and mankind’s seemingly innate ability to twist itself into convoluted knots over the most simplistic situations. In true Kafka style the adaptation delves into weighty themes with seemingly casual abandon and with large doses of absurd comedy, overt eroticism and mind-twisting confusion.
The Trial is a visual and mental adventure of the deepest kind. One well worth the journey.
sydney theatre company, the trail, louise fox, franz kafka, matthew Lutton, Ewen Leslie