Redemption
A dear friend just performed in a dreadful play and I, friend that I am, went and saw the show. Not wanting to upset him during the run, I sent him a thanks and we’ll talk email pointing out the couple of things I really enjoyed about the performance.
When we finally talked, I was able to say to him that I really thought the play was awful. He didn’t agreed with me, but he did see how I could have seen it that way. What I told him was that there was no redemption at the end. I don’t like plays that lack redemption. In fact, that’s what I think the theatre is for.
The word redemption comes from Latin roots meaning to redeem which means to buy back. There was nothing to take away from the show that I saw that had any flavor of redemption whatsoever. It was gory and dark and angry at the beginning and gory, dark, angry and heartless at the end.
We’re on what I’ve dubbed “HEDDA lockdown” this weekend. My sweetie is directing HEDDA GABLER at Tufts University and this is tech weekend. Two days of 12-hour rehearsals to get all the lights, costumes, sets, props, and sound in order so that they can open on the 18th.
HEDDA is not about redemption either. Oh maybe it is. Maybe the act of taking her own life in the penultimate moment of the play is a twisted form of redemption, definitely twisted. Her production is terrific and I think it’s going to be a good evening in the theatre, but it’s not redemption as I like it.
I like the redemption of musicals. The leads get one another in the end (boy/girl, girl/boy, boy-/boy, girl/girl) and all’s well that ends well. The world is unredeemed enough that I think the theatre ought to take its redemptive role seriously.
Musicals are ordered to provide redemption, and I think we need it. In Billy Elliott on Broadway a coal miner’s son wants to be a ballet dancer. By following his heart, he gets what he desires. The theatre, for me, functions as a mirror of the best way to live. We needn’t wallow in other than the best ways to live—all we have to do is turn on a computer or a television for that.
So the next time you go see a show, ask yourself what you’d like to “buy back,” (another way to put this is “take away”) from the production. I’m only buying back the best ways to live as shown to me by the gracious Imaginary Invalid.
P. S. If you’re in Boston, come see HEDDA. Feb 18th to 20th and Feb 25th to 32th. The box office number is 617-627-3493.
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February 15, 2010 8:32 am
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