Venus in Fur by David Ives.
Directed by Caroline Stacey. Designed by Imogen Keen. Lighting by Verity Hampson.
Sound design by Kyle Sheedy. Accent coach. Diana Nixon. Stage Manager. Angharad
Lindley. Street One. The Street Theatre.
Until
September 2. 2018. Bookings: 62471223 or street@thestreet.org.au
Reviewed by Peter Wilkins
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| Joanna Richards as Vanda Jordan and Craig Alexander as Thomas Novachek in The Street Theatre's production of David Ives' Venus in Fur. |
An enormous, shuddering
thunderclap, followed by an incandescent
flash of lightning illuminates the basement of a deserted sweat shop,
where playwright Thomas Novachek (Craig Alexander) has been unsuccessfully
auditioning actresses for the lead role in his adaptation of Leopold
Sacher-Masoch’s 1870 novel, Venus in Fur.
Nature’s powerful force presages human
nature’s encounter between will and dominance in David Ives’ fascinating gender drama of the same title as
Sacher-Masoch’s tale of masochism, sexuality and degradation.
An expletive shouts out from the
top of the staircase of Imogen Keen’s imposing set design. Aspiring actress,
Vanda Jordan (Joanna Richards) stumbles upon the scene, cursing her lateness
and fearing failure to be auditioned by Novachek. Brash and loud, Jordan
appears utterly unsuitable for the role of the cool and composed Wanda von
Dunajew of Sacher-Masoch’s novel. Comical in her forthrightness and hilarious
in her fumbling, Jordan is a self-mocking assertion of the actor’s powerlessness
in the light of causes of rejection. In an act of deliberate wile, Jordan
removes her coat to reveal the leather underwear of a dominatrix, without a
whip but with the erotic power to allure.
From this moment, Ives’s initial
spoof of the audition process assumes a very different tenor, while still
couched within the convention of an audition. Jordan dresses in the period
dress she has brought with her and chameleon-like adopts the composure and
presence of the nineteenth century noblewoman. It is a transition that both unsettles
and fascinates Novachek, who finds himself inextricably drawn into playing the
part of servant Severin von Kusiemski.
What ensues is a power play that blurs the line between reality and
fantasy. Although admitting to only having glanced at the script on the train,
Jordan has arrived with the entire script and the nineteenth century novel and
launches word perfect into the role. Reality and fantasy intertwine in Caroline
Stacey’s intriguing and tightly directed production. Ives, with Brechtian
deliberateness, brings Jordan out of character in key moments of Wanda’s
empowerment of Kusiemski, and Jordan’s loud and bombastic persona shatters
illusion. As quickly, she resumes the magnetizing allure of von Dunajew.
Audience and Novachek are flung into a revolving vortex of absorption and
entrapment as Jordan cunningly and manipulatively shifts the power of seduction
and subservience from character to actress to the last triumphant moment, when
Novachek and Severin scream to the departing actress and goddess of desire, “Hail
Aphrodite”. Sexual power has played out
its dominant end game, and the audience is left wondering, with Novachek, who
is this actress? Why has she come? Who is the auditioner and who the
auditionee? Ives offers no conclusive answers. Like Novachek, strapped to the
heating flu, the audience is left to consider the questions and discover for
themselves the answers.
Every aspect of the Street
Theatre’s production is brilliantly realized. There are some outstanding
examples of powerfully staged professional theatre emerging on Canberra’s local
stages, and Venus in Fur is dressed
in the finest theatrical fashion to conquer any stage. Imogen Keen’s stunning set
design, built by Stephen Crossley and his team, sets the tone from the start.
Verity Hampson’s lighting design, operated by Angharad Lindley, shifts the mood
with subtle persuasion, accompanied by Kyle Sheedy’s sound design, operated by
Seth Edwards=-Ellis. Dianna Nixon’s accent coaching and Emma Strapps’ movement
direction add to the total professionalism of a production that does Canberra
theatre proud.
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| Craig Alexander as Severin Kusiemski and Joanna Richards as Wanda von Dunajew in Venus in Fur |
At its heart, though, are the
performances of Alexander and Richards under the astute and disciplined
direction of Stacey. This is a formidable team of artists, who have created an
unmissable theatrical tour de force at the Street. Richards beguiles and bewitches,
effortlessly and magnetically playing the power game to perfection. She embodies the seductive song of the Sirens,
the enchanting beauty of Helen of Troy, the heavenly adoration of the Goddess
of Love, the dangerous attraction of a Medusa and the powerful feistiness of
the rough, tough New York survivor. Her performance holds the audience in its
sway.
Alexander’s Novachek is a victim
from the start after a day of unresolved auditions. His power as a first time
director of his own play crumbles under the forceful presence of Jordan who
then shifts his authority to subservience, bewitched and oppressed by natural
forces over which he has no control. Alexander evokes pity and empathy, a
confusion of reaction as he wields his characters’ frailties and desperate longings.
His delivery of the account of Kusiemski’s beating with a briar by his sadistic
Aunt reveals Sacher-Masoch’s beguiling fascination with the pleasure in pain of
the masochist.
The complexity of performing
double roles is surmounted with utter aplomb, as two outstanding actors grapple
with Ives’ themes and hold the audience for one hundred minutes of magnificent
theatre and skilfully directed ensemble playing. Venus in Fur warrants a far longer season and queues jostling for
standbys. In other theatrical Meccas this production would be the talk of the
town. Be seduced and give in to the power of Venus in Fur at The Street Theatre before the season ends!
