Unbound at The Blue Room Theatre
Review, in print for Volume 92 Pelican Magazine.
“Presented by Blank Space Productions, Unbound is a story for our age: a bewitching collision of classical text and dynamic contemporary forms that is sure to challenge everything you think you know about the Bard.”
In literature, classics are greatly defined by their timelessness their ability to give meaning to an audience, regardless of how many years after its original context.
Shakespeare's works are widely considered classics for that exact reasoning. Julius Caesar teaches us that absolute power corrupts absolutely, The Tempest teaches us about the underlying orders of hierarchies in society and the inflexibility of its power, while Romeo and Juliet teaches us about the entwining of free will and the timeless belief of fate.
These stories are their own kind of parable, and whilst so much of their value can be transcended into our Twenty-First Century, there without a doubt still are key elements of power imbalances between classes, races, religions and genders that, whilst still prevalent today, existed to a much greater and more socially accepted degree in Shakespeare' England.
Whilst I greatly admire the works of Shakespeare - having even had the chance to visit his family home, New Place, in the heart of Stratford-upon-Avon, and admired the sculptures of his most famous works one simply cannot shake their beliefs and values inherent to our time today.
With great anticipation, I sat to watch Unbound, a Blank Space production at Perth's very own Blue Room Theatre.
One word - goosebumps.
Unbound was the fruition of three years of work that set out to explore the women of 'The Canon', in particular by the Bard (Shakespeare), through an amalgamation of various existing plays and sonnets.
In literature, the 'canon' or western canon' - for those new to the phrase - refers to a collective body of work deemed important, influential and consequential by society, which is largely (though not wholly) composed of works in literature, music, philosophy and art by heteronormative, European white men from privileged socio- economic and educational backgrounds.
The production itself can be seen as:
“A twisting journey of unpacking the canon, finding moments that we felt needed addressing and responding to them. We began in 2019 making work of all different styles and approaches from dance to modernised retellings. We reworked scenes and adjusted the narrative to give more power and autonomy to the female characters. And we also amalgamated multiple plays into a single moment”
The three leading sisters - Emilia (from Othello), Ophelia (from Hamlet) and Volumnia (from Coriolanus) - took centre stage in a way unprecedented in any of Shakespeare's works. Unbound explores their resilience, direction and relationships in the fight to stay fit in a world defined by power and its dynamics.
Across two acts (Act I: The Kingdom, and Act II: The Forest), the production explored "narrative-based moments, and Lother moments bent towards the abstract and joyful. Two very different forms that spoke powerfully in juxtaposition to each other. And in this moment Unbound became a conversation between these two forms. If we want to empower women in Shakespeare's canon, if we want to unpack and respond to the restrictions placed on gender and sexuality, neither of these forms can be silenced. Both need to be explored."
The first act led us from coffins to thrones to high walls by open water the set consisted of heavy cubes that were constantly changing and evolving to depict the scene with powerful simplicity that encouraged the audience to focus on the power of the dialogue, movement, and dynamic relationships between characters.
Wholly full circle, the opening act both began and ended with the death of a queen - a powerful parallel that pushes the mind to try and battle those Shakespearean concepts of fate and free will in the lives of women characters in these classic plays, and in the society they represent.
Their plot - utterly powerful - touched on many key themes in feminist analysis, as seen through the exploration of gaslighting, madness, hysteria, emotional evaluations of women as leaders, power structures in romantic relationships, the concept of sisterhood, and the demonstration of various female figures in and out of power throughout the course of the play.
The intensity of the emotions conveyed at times felt too intimate to watch - not just love and lust, but rage, grief, betrayal, loss, hurt, fear, empowerment, strength, and influence.
The colouring of the costuming and set was also noteworthy. Black and white costumes and set pieces were disrupted - and jarringly at that only twice. Once, by an arm drenched in blood, which only highlighted the intensity of the character's deliverance of violent justice, and at the end of the act, through the literal tearing of a gleaming white crown that had circulated between the hands and wills of various characters - which shed a colourful confetti onto the stage after one of the most tragic scenes of the performance.
Honestly, it was cinematic.
The second act was otherworldly, and "finds the women transported into a technicolour dreamscape where inner fears and desires are unleashed in a whirl of movement, dance and sound" (Blue Room Theatre).
Where "The Kingdom' explored the way these stories are reflected in our contemporary Western society, which continues to struggle against patriarchal structures as it moves through various global movements and waves of evolving feminism, 'The Forest' explores concepts of femininity, gender, and identity without labels and structured relationships, but instead through performative and dramatic arts.
There was nothing but colour - and it was everywhere - from a mountain of confetti in the Blue Room theatre itself, to the fluorescent costumes of the characters. It was quite beautiful, how this act visually depicted the chaos of a Shakespearean play with humour, colour, sound, and movement.
This act had me thinking less, and feeling more. Part of that, I believe, comes from the accessibility of movement and colour for interpretation in comparison to the complexities and nuances of Shakespearean English; and part also comes from the shock of the transition between themes and styles between the acts.
The whole time, I couldn't stop thinking about how phenomenal this would be to photograph. It was one of the most captivating performances I've ever seen, with a level of acting that was incomprehensible to my mind - so talented, it made imagining how the actors communicate and behave in reality quite difficult.
A huge, well-deserved congratulations to Bridget Le May, Gala Shevtsov, Hannah Evelyn, Hock Edwards, Kynan Hughes, and Rylan Marano for their truly incredible, world-class performances. And to Amber Kitney, Bec Price, Hannah Portwine, Kat Shaw and Mickey Moroz for their work on Unbound.
Should it ever be performed again, watch it.
Read the article on Pelican here.