Rotozaza, Rotozaza3

Review in Issue 12-3 | Autumn 2000

The premise of Rotozaza3 is brilliant. Over three consecutive nights, three different actors are invited to perform solo in a play for which they have no script, character, stage directions or idea as to what will happen. The potential for an anarchic re-evaluation of the relationship between the actor alone on stage and his audience is great.

On this particular evening, David Rosenberg was the actor led blindfolded onto a stage littered with debris and punctuated with a suitcase, a table and a wheelchair. A voice directs him to remove his blindfold and immediately we see Rosenberg's dilemma: how should he react? Suddenly the accepted purpose and control of an actor once he steps on stage are relinquished to an anonymous voice which directs his every move and emotional reaction via a headset or projections on the back wall of the theatre. All he can do is react honestly and truthfully in each dictated moment.

The result is interesting and at times funny, if not a little hard-going. Images challenging machismo – gun-toting and tutu-wearing – are surreal and alienating and the music is at times tortuous. Rosenberg copes well but he is perhaps too contemplative or considered a performer to be able to react in a way that is truly free and interesting – both for himself and his audience. To be fair, however, I think he was also inhibited by the recorded voice giving the orders. If the anonymous voice had been live, the opportunities to really play with (or torture?) the actor may have been more satisfactorily realised.

Presenting Artists
Presenting Venue
Date Seen
  1. Jul 2000

This article in the magazine

Issue 12-3
p. 24