A Ridiculous Man

Old Stage, Gray Hall

The style of the performance is defined as a “concertbutnotaconcert.” It contains a great deal of music, which lives and enters into conflicts with the hero, and even runs out of control. It twinkles like a dead small star, it creaks as might unoiled hinges. It tears around like a madman, from peasant dances to Tom Waits, drowning out the confession of this “ridiculous man.” It seems as if he was drawn by Brueghel — a grimacing cripple, a carnival fool, who unexpectedly emerges as the main character of a mystery play. This story of a soul that fell but was healed, this dream of a ridiculous hero, is played out as a nervous, irritable Brechtian Song the day before suicide is committed. Musical instruments, barely visible stairs, a ring of light (is it a half moon or the half barrel of a gun imagined by a feverish, sleepy mind?). This is Peter Brook’s “empty space.” A hero in outer space. A hero in the Void. Behind his closed eyes, as in the grave, nothing but darkness and his own emptiness. What will happen when he awakes?