The memories of two people, Merridy and her father, are explored in a new devised piece, but the American company lagom’s work left me feeling confused about its narrative aims and lost in its method.
The structure of the piece lacked focus or direction. One minute Merridy’s father is dying of cancer and the next the audience is thrust into a game of ‘what would you take from your house if it was burning down?’ Objects were used to tell the story - a small figure of a man, a scarf, a knife and several shots of whisky for the audience to knock back – which were intriguing but ultimately their relevance escaped me. While there was something to be said for the premise of one character telling the past memories of two people, and the interesting array of eclectic items in the space, there was little else that held my attention. An old-fashioned lightbox in the otherwise dark space was an imaginative image, but this alone does not suggest physical theatre and I was hoping for more physicality in the storytelling.
As for Merridy’s performance, she is simultaneously welcoming and aloof and her presence on stage ends up feeling distant. The show’s concept originated as a deconstruction of Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard, which might have been intended to be cutting-edge and experimental, but its frustrating execution sent it straight over the top.
