Few plays begin with a request that audience members tear up white serviettes to make faux snow that will be used as a prop later in the play. There is probably good reason for that. One play that does however, is the National Theatre of Scotland’s The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart, a modern take on a traditional Scottish gathering of song and dance, or ceilidh, performed in Adelaide as part of the 2013 Adelaide Festival.
Prudencia Hart (Melody Grove) is a buttoned down, tweed-skirted academic specializing in Scottish border ballads and hellish folk tales. She attends a conference where her old-fashioned views are traduced by other academics including the insulting Colin (Paul Mc Cole), who studies football chants. When a dispirited Prudencia attempts to leave the conference she can’t; her car is snowed in (as a result of a paper serviette storm). Prudencia reluctantly joins the oafish Colin at a local pub with a view to finding accommodation for the evening. A drug and alcohol fuelled night follows and Prudencia descends into a version of hell. She then falls in love with the Devil and is rescued, physically and romantically (and incomprehensibly) by Colin. She then proceeds to sing karaoke (Kylie Minogue’s ‘Can’t Get You Out of My Head’).
David Grieg’s labouring script suffocates any potential offered by the play’s slight premise. While the play features several songs, it is mainly spoken in rhyming couplets; some are inventive but the majority of them are either unbearably obvious or painfully contrived. Prudencia’s sexual undoing by the Devil and her last-minute romance with Colin are completely illogical and are sadly devoid of any sense of irony. There is also something unsettling about a strong woman with independent views only being validated (and rescued) by repugnant male characters through sexuality.
In the absence of a stage the actors walked amongst the audience who were seated at tables. The actors acknowledged and interacted with the audience inconsistently; the startled audience never appeared truly comfortable with this inconsistency. Audience participation, when cleverly orchestrated, can elevate a theatrical experience, however it is self-defeating to have an audience distracted by elements other than plot and performance. To enable the cast to move amongst the audience the house-lights were not dimmed and the uncomfortably bright lighting highlighted the stark unattractiveness and unsuitability of the venue, a dated multi-purpose room with a side bar.
At over two and a half hours long the play far outstays its welcome.
Rating: 2 stars out of 5
The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart
Devised and created by (writer) David Greig and (director) Wils Wilson, with (designer) Georgia McGuinness and (composer) Alasdair Macrae
Cast: Annie Grace, Melody Grove, Alasdair Macrae, Paul McCole and David McKay
The German Club, Adelaide
1 – 9 March
Adelaide Festival 2013
www.adelaidefestival.com.au
1 – 17 March
