Even if you haven’t read
George Orwell’s ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’ you may be familiar with words such as
‘Orwellian’ or ‘Big brother.’ The protagonist, Winston Smith (Mark Arends)
plunges you into an uncomfortable state almost immediately. He has numerous panic
attacks and is unsure of where he is. From the opening scene, he’s alone
writing privately on his distain for Big brother and –within a flash second –
is surrounded by people discussing the literary context of Orwell’s novel.
In this Big brother world that
Oceania is, civilians take part in a ‘two minutes of hate’ session that entails
aggressively screaming and shouting much of what they have been indoctrinated
with as displayed on a large scale screens. The words, ‘war is peace,’ and
‘freedom is slavery’ come up on Tim Reid’s video designs. As a viewer, it is a
scary sight to endure as it undermines the daily comforts of an English
democratic society.
The stagecraft and character
of Smith make a startled audience anxious, uncertain and stress: after all,
it’s a world where no one can be trusted. Smith, who has suspicions about Julia
(Hara Yannas), a supposed purist of the party admits to loving him and they
begin a clandestine relationship that they believe Big brother has no knowledge
of. Yet in reality, He knows everything. Arends and Yannas show variations of
rebellion through the lovers’ gestures of tasting hard-to-get chocolate, sex,
and display of disorder and destruction; throwing clothes, furniture and paper
all over the room. Together, they plot to
overthrow the party with the counter-revolutionary party, ‘The Brotherhood’ and
once O’Brien (Tim Dutton) poses as a member, all hope of a free future
diminishes. He ensnares them simply to trap and stop them.
Credit goes to Chloe Lamford
for her stage design of the scene that separates the lovers with sirens
and alarms, which lead to a nightmare; enter room 101. Surveillance cameras,
speedy soldiers, helicopter interference, and loud airspace noises cover the
corners of the stage. Smith is clothed in a straitjacket and the torture
commences. Dutton plays a calm and collected O’Brien who presents the
ideals of the party as if it were rational yet every time he hears Smith answer
‘4’ to his question, ‘what is 2 +2?’ flashes and silent screams shift the stage
that sees him electrocuting Smith leaving the rebel spitting out blood,
teeth-less and fingerless. The worst is to yet to come. Room 101, the brainwash
room that uses fear to drive out thought crimes dig out Smith’s own fear: rats.
Just as the rodent's squeaky sounds begin to accumulate, he cries out
desperately, ‘do it to Julia!’ and it is here that he relinquishes all love for
her.
This adaptation by Robert Icke
and Duncan Macmillan is a winner with its collaboration with Headlong, the
Nottingham Playhouse and the Almeida. After the success of sell-out runs at the
West End, they have added more dates to stage one of the best English novels of
modern times.
1984 is showing until
to August 23rd at the Playhouse theatre
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