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Gosh, this was a truly fascinating short play at the Orange Tree – our first venture to see a play for some while and a great start, from our point of view, to our autumn season at the theatre. We were seeing a preview.
The Orange Tree Theatre’s blurb on this piece can be found by clicking here.
This is not a naturalistic piece. The cast of four narrate the piece, about an unnamed Israeli violinist who is 9 months pregnant living in an apartment in Amsterdam, on the Keizersgracht (one of the canal-side streets).
Are we merely being taken on a voyage through the violinists own febrile, paranoid imaginings or is this a thriller about the uncovering of secrets from Amsterdam’s era of Nazi occupation or are we witnessing a strange brew, mixing those things?
Janie would have preferred some more answers by the end of it, whereas I thought this 80 minute piece was very deliberately leaving a trail of enigmas and unanswerable questions, while at the same time keeping us entertained and weaving sufficient plot lines to tell a story.
All four cast members were excellent; we’d seen Fiston Barek and Hara Yannas recently at the Orange Tree. Daniel Abelson and Michal Horowicz were also strong.
We’d also seen director Matthew Xia’s work at the Orange Tree recently. The style is a bit “workshoppy”, but I think that is the nature of the play and it is hard to imagine how the piece might work in a more stagey syle.
But the greatest plaudits from me go to the writing. I have now read and seen one heck of a lot of plays, so it is rare now to find a writer’s voice so novel and pleasing. For sure I will look out for Maya Arad Yasur’s work again.
Did Janie and I decompress/discuss at length over Spanish food at Don Fernando’s this time? Of course we did.
Did we get home in time to see Bianca Andreescu beat Serena Williams at Flushing? Yes, but only because Bianca kindly lost 4 games in a row (including a championship point) to keep the match alive long enough for us to get home and see the last two games.
Did we play tennis the next morning as usual and then go on to Gunnersbury Museum to see some aspects of BEAT? Yes, yes.
Anyway, returning to the subject of Amsterdam at The Orange Tree; it’s running until 12 October 2019 and we would thoroughly recommend it to anyone who likes imaginative, modern drama.
Reviews for this production, if/when they come, might be found here.