It takes a woman 5.6 seconds to fall 44 stories from the roof a building to the pavement. Six if you take into account wind resistance. The swift corporeal descent to instant death is equivalent to the speed of the stock market crashing into red. Too fast for anybody to do anything about it but what about before hand?November 7, 1929, two weeks after Wall Street's first implosion, an unnamed woman took her life in this manner just like many others. An eleventh hour brought about by world conditions beyond our control is something that could happen to anyone, rich or poor, you or me. Suckerville explores the desperation of ordinary men and women through stories from different eras whose lives were destroyed by the seemingly arbitrary machinations of the the stock market. In one suicide note, a man writes "I have made such a mess of things I believe this to be the most satisfactory solution for everybody concerned". The intertwining stories are eloquently told through performance, media and song in this short Poor theatre piece. A hulking man (Christopher Norton Walker) dressed in shirt and tie details the cold statistics while a young hopeful woman (Lucy Andrews) on the verge of matrimonial bliss walks up and down a narrow plank telling of her dreams of one day owning a house by a watermill in France. She marries, moves to the suburbs and all is well until the current worldwide recession calls her name. A soft spoken girl (Amelie Rousseaux) strums on a guitar and speaks of the lonely life of the dispossessed; coming home, putting her ready-meal into the microwave, sitting and waiting for nothing. Another (Josie Glover) moves from TV to TV hypnotized by a stream of images. But it's not all doom and gloom, it also speaks to the possibility of regeneration.The entire performance has a natural vitality with unaffected simplicity. It would remind you of a time you might have brought a few people around to the house and had a really vibrant discussion as someone belted out a song now then. The performers are grounded and handle the material with fragile grace. Singer/Composer Ms. Rousseaux sings with a guileless sweetness. Her version of the 1929 song "I'm Falling" is redolent of times past and of regret.The opening is somewhat stilted. Performers shout out the performance cliche 'Fact!' followed by a statistic or historical point. Critically, it defines people as victims rather than participants in a material world. What is the responsibility of the individual during the arching cycle of the markets? What about beforehand? This side of the issue is not sufficiently addressed. Suckerville is presented as a work in progress and evolves from week to week. It is, however, an endearing show that does not require anything of the audience; it simply flows over you.
