I Guess If The Stage Exploded

Do you lovers of theatre really remember shows you saw decades ago or even one person shows from just months ago?

In one of the Sydney Festival’s About An Hour program, British performer Sylvia Rimat works hard to make herself unforgettable.  We hear the odd voice over from some of the psychologists and neuroscientists she consulted, offering tips on how the brain can better remember.

Rimat shares all sorts of audience participation games so that we keep a visual diary of her, practice relaxation and self-discipline, and exploit our power to remember locations best of all.  Via Skype, we cross to an eccentric signbearer on a Berlin airfield and then an unsmiling party maker in a nearby suburb dedicating his efforts to the birthday of an audience member.

Drably dressed, surrounded by 1940’s furniture, including a tempting drinks table, Rimat speaks in a monotonal accent, reminiscent of her native German and adapted Bristol home.

Occasionally she dances mechanically in an old frilly lampshade or walks the stage leaving white footprints. Yes, the questions are existential, with our own legacies all probably unforgettable, which, of course, is Rimat herself.  Content-wise, she delivers no thoughts, images or emotions which will stay with us. 

She conjectures that I Guess If The Stage Exploded… we’d remember that.  And unable to deliver an “unforgettable” elephant, she instead walks back onstage with an owl (who looks at her and us as though we’re all very stupid).  

Rimat’s one idea may be engaging but it barely lasts the hour.

Martin Portus

Photographer: Prudence Upton.