Friday, April 20, 2007

Dissocia

Went to London last night to see Anthony Neilson's 'The Wonderful World of Dissocia', and I really enjoyed it. There were some bits that weren't as good as (in my humble opinion) they could have been (e.g. the actors seemed a bit uncomfortable during the first half, and the singing could have been better), but it was a really good play. The one point I wanted to raise though, is that why is it that when people in plays/films go to fantasy make-believe lands, at the end it's always revealed to be either a dream or that they're mentally ill or they're on drugs? Why can't the fantasy world actually exist? I mean, people didn't know that Australia existed until 1770 (apart from the indigenous people living there). Salman Rushdie wrote a brilliant essay sort of saying the same thing, but I do feel disappointed that these crazy places are always passed off as a hallucination or a cat nap in literature. It's not widely publicised, but Dorothy actually chooses to live in Oz with her Auntie Em in Book 6 of the Oz series, and yet most people take the film's "it was all a dream, and you were there, and you were there" ending as gospel. Just narks me off.

One other thing to note about being at the Royal Court is that all the girls in the building, aside from me, all looked the same. They were all skinny, flat-chested, with dark hair (mainly), all dressed in a manner that they would like you to call 'quirky', and were all talking pretentiously about this play or other (whilst drinking ridiculously small glasses of white wine). It was like the Court has a cloning factory out the back for creating it's staff and audience members. There was one girl in a group of people who was being introduced as a 'writer' to someone else, and she looked exactly the same as well. No wonder I'm perceived to not fit in there.

7 comments:

morphean ramble said...

It was a good piece, wasn't it?

However, I totally agree - I thought the acting was a bit dodgy, considering where we were! And I mean in some really basic areas too - projection, cadence, etc.

I also get what you're saying with the fantsy - that's the thing I've been trying to go with in Brutal - the murders aren't just in someone's head, they are actually happening, but it's still unreal... if you see what I mean

morphean ramble said...

and who perceives you to not fit in at the court? :-D

Lucy Ann Wade said...

The bookshop guy at the Royal Court for one! "What's a girl like you doing with that book" he asked in the summer. OK, so I was buying it for Morph, but I didn't like the presumption.

morphean ramble said...

Maybe he just thinks Gary Owen's shite and that you looked like someone with better taste?

Sabrina Mei-Li Smith said...

Man! I so gotta get myself to the royal court (if only how to show them how a real writer drinks!) :)

morphean ramble said...

in thru the tearducts

Alex said...

And I'll show them how a real drinker writes.