FESTIVAL THEATRE | Reviews
BANKSY: THE ROOM IN THE ELEPHANT How art made a man homeless ●●●●●
‘I guess y’all wanna hear about Banksy,’ says Titus Covington (Eastenders’ Gary Beadle). It’s a reasonable assumption – the artist’s name is, after all, in the show’s title, and anything he touches is guaranteed to generate fervent interest from his many adoring fans. The skilful manoeuvre Tom Wainwright has pulled off with his script for The Room in the Elephant is making this adoration the focal point of the story, staging Covington’s tale while simultaneously asking why it’s being watched, and why it was even written in the first place.
Covington is an LA native who lived on the fringes of Tinseltown. He had been living in a repurposed water tank for seven years when Banksy arrived on his doorstep, asking if he could decorate the tank with the words, ‘This looks a bit like an elephant’. Covington agreed, unaware that his home would become an object of desire for art collectors. In short, the tank was purchased and moved to a storage warehouse; Covington was left homeless, living out of urban caves and wheeling his life around in a shopping trolley.
Beadle’s performance is, to use a word from one of his coruscating soliloquies, ‘volcanic’. At times told in the style of a YouTube confessional, at others in the rhythmic incantation of a street rapper-turned-ghetto prophet, his emotions burst forth in a flurry of one-two punches: bravado, then shock; despair, then rebellion; delight, then bemusement; confusion, then rage. It’s a performance so involving that we’re prevented from seeing the subtext until director Emma Callander puts it right in front of us: that we’re once again appreciating an artistic construct in place of real life; that, as Covington says, we want a story, not the truth. (Niki Boyle) ■ Pleasance Courtyard, 556 6550, until 26 Aug, 1pm, £9–£12 (£8–£11).
I
S A R A M O C A J
ANNA A brutal tour de force ●●●●● YOU ALL KNOW ME – I’M JACK RUBY! Killer portrait of a murderer ●●●●●
A lift opens and we step inside. Emerging moments later, a stark, sterile basement corridor lies before us. Bright strip lights buzz overhead, as we’re ushered to stand against the walls. And so it begins: Badac Theatre Company’s harrowing, brutal and at times deeply affecting production, the story of the life, work and eventual assassination of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya. Having previously explored domestic violence and the Holocaust, Badac are no cosy documentarians; this latest project is no less demanding.
Marnie Baxter is utterly compelling as the
increasingly desperate and determined Anna, while the rest of the cast, particularly Saskia Schuck as The Witness, are relentless in their endeavour to show the full horrors of a terrifying autocracy. Although the events are very much Anna’s
experiences – and those brave enough to tell her their stories – Badac speaks directly to journalists around the world, and the truth-tellers and whistle- blowers silenced and ignored. This is gruelling, powerful theatre that demands
we, the public, listen. Apathy is not an option here. (Anna Millar) ■ Summerhall, 0845 874 3001, until 25 Aug (not 12), 8.30pm, £10 (£8).
84 THE LIST FESTIVAL 8–15 Aug 2013
Do we really know the man who shot the man who shot President Kennedy? Was the eponymous Dallas nightclub-owner part of a Mafia-organised plot to whack Lee Harvey Oswald, as history generally credits him to be, or was Ruby acting under other impulses?
This cleverly conceived and smartly executed one-man show proposes an answer to the second question that suggests history has done Ruby a disservice. The portrait presented – sleazy, violent, uneducated, emotionally unstable – certainly doesn’t show him in a flattering light. But it is rounded enough to also reveal him as principled, loyal, foolish and unlucky. The result is a pleasingly complex dramatic study that’s in turn funny, abhorrent and poignant.
Writer-performer Clifford Barry’s portrayal of Ruby is absolutely terrific. Barry’s short, stocky build, and bullish voice convince on a physical level, and contrast effectively with the quieter, more emotional moments Ruby experiences. By being as much about the man as the conspiracy theories, the show both provokes and engages. (Miles Fielder) ■ theSpace @ Surgeon’s Hall, 510 2384, until 24 Aug (not 11, 18), 2pm, £7 (£6).
THE THREE LITTLE PIGS Study of South African police corruption ●●●●●
Orwellian is a word usually used to describe dystopian scenarios, but dark satire The Three Little Pigs takes a tip from Animal Farm by reimagining the inhabitants of a police interrogation room as a selection of animals. Two brother pigs have been killed, and a goat and
a chicken interrogate the one remaining brother. Weaving a complex story of corruption, with cats, rats and various other creatures offering their self- serving opinions, the narrative points towards the involvement of a criminal mastermind known as the Big Bad Wolf. Part of the Assembly’s South African season, director Tara Notcutt has created this adult fairy tale with her three actors (Rob van Vuuren, James Cairns, Albert Pretorius), and the result is a spare but ultimately strong hour of theatre. The grotesque characters reflect the internecine goings-on in a country where, as one character says, ‘murder is a national pastime’.
It’s tough going at times, and the animal metaphor gets a bit strained, but The Three Little Pigs is an absorbing hour of theatre. (Eddie Harrison) ■ Assembly George Square, 623 3030, until 26 Aug (not 12), 5.45pm, £14–£15 (£12–£13).