Lightwork, Here’s What I Did With My Body One Day

Review in Issue 17-1 | Spring 2005

A man is sitting at a table. A moving train is projected across a screen. The stage is energised by image. Colour and light spark the space into dynamism. Stationary performers are thrown into life, vitalised by video. The man at the table travels. The journey begins. David Ree is a genome scientist from a family of killers. A cryptic narrative is told with innovative finesse. The Killers are three generations of Ree forefathers acting, under a family curse, the murder of French intellectuals in traffic accidents. As the relationships between fathers, sons and ancestors are explored, so are the interwoven genes of humanity. Technological media never detracts or competes with theatricality. Instead, it uses the best of itself by remaining unique to its filmic properties – conjuring visual rhythms of pace, colour, location and situation that seem to be caught best through a camera's eye. It is the relationship between live performance and video that renders the piece so compelling. In the midst of a highly technological visual feast, the lives and hearts of characters still strongly resound. The entire cast gives intelligent and versatile performances. Colin Hurley as David Ree is particularly triumphant. That the characters are vivid, the visuals sleek and the narrative gripping serves as concrete proof that these components do not have to exist in mutual exclusivity. Action and storytelling is at the basis of all representative forms, including theatre and media. By employing what is unique to both forms and bringing them into vital relation with each other, Lightwork creates a contemporary coup de théâtre.

Presenting Artists
Presenting Venue
Date Seen
  1. Sep 2004

This article in the magazine

Issue 17-1
p. 28