Jonathan Oldfield brings an intriguing one man show to the stage: sitting in his living room watching the world go by behind his one way mirror out onto the world, safe in the knowledge that he can see out, but cannot be seen. It goes from intriguing to bizarre when he tells you this is a true story – not based on a true story, but actually what happened. Yet the way he has designed this is interactive, involving the audience at pivotal moments.
A unique show; one that asks interesting self-reflective questions
Sitting behind the mirror – a big glass pane in the centre of the stage – he tells three stories from his grey notebook. His writing is richly embroidered with visual and auditory descriptions that bring the story to life in the imagination. The first is a ‘bin man’, emptying the bins; then a man carrying a white plastic bag dressed in a suit jacket and jogging bottoms; the third is about the fast-food place opposite him called “Binge” that serves spicy fried chicken which isn’t quite spicy enough and crispy chips that aren’t quite crispy enough. At a point in each story, the audience is instructed to make a choice as to what he should do: to intervene and interact, or to stay concealed behind the mirror. The choice is made through a very clever set up using pictures on audience members’ phones.
Coming out from behind the mirror; his overarching story within these episodes is also very bizarre: having moved into this new flat just before lockdown happened and then being stuck inside alone for the duration. All this is recognisable of course, but the addition of the one-way mirror looking out emphasises the isolation and separateness from the rest of the world. He talks of his other acting work on Zoom and having to be several someone elses as his only interaction with people taking a toll on his own identity and ultimately losing himself in physical and emotional health issues. It also moves from the surreal to the creepy when he finds a mysterious book about magic mirrors, and gets an audience member on stage to read out the other end of a phone conversation when he is trying to find out about it.
Jonathan is a wonderfully confident performer with a rich tapestry of images created by crisp writing and a clear voice. It’s a well crafted piece overall, although there was a moment of leaving the stage bare for a little too long and starting the show wearing an eyemask has the unfortunate effect of distancing the audience from the show, although his subsequent warmth repairs that. The clever effect of this show is that you can take it on many levels – as just a comedy, or, asking profound and important questions about whether you take part in people’s lives, or take part in your own life, or just watch. Do you abdicate responsibility for other humans when you know them, or even if you don’t, and how much responsibility to take for your own actions. It raises important questions about the effect of being cut off from other people, especially to those who live alone: as experienced as part of lockdown. The audience are invited to choose to be a watcher or be watched, to see or to be seen; and then experience the consequences, with another audience member brought on stage to fulfil a magic role. It’s certainly a unique show; and one that asks interesting self-reflective questions of the audience experiencing it.
