TALENT, VERSATILITY PROPEL ROMANCE
Constellations works because it never seems forced or fabricated
Since its première in 2012 at the tiny upstairs theatre at London’s Royal Court Theatre, Nick Payne’s romantic drama Constellations has been one of the most sought-after new plays on both sides of the Atlantic.
Constellations comes to Calgary courtesy of Alberta Theatre Projects and is playing in the Arts Commons Martha Cohen Theatre until March 17.
It follows the relationship of beekeeper Roland (Mike Tan) and physicist Marianne (Jamie Konchak), beginning with their meeting at a barbecue.
Payne has decided he’s going to take what is essentially a traditional story of love, longing, infidelity and loss and present it as fractured storytelling.
Before Constellations’ 80 minutes runs out, we hear snippets of the same dialogue numerous times but jumbled so that sometimes Marianne and Roland are in the early stages of their relationship and sometimes in the middle or even nearer the end.
Lines which initially make little sense eventually become crystal clear and are either funny or poignant.
At other times, Payne has the same scene repeated four or five times with different emphasis, as is the case in Roland’s proposal and again in each of the character’s admission of infidelity.
Tan’s slyness takes the proposal from cute to hilarious, making it a highlight of the show. His character is the first to admit infidelity and he delivers his confession with everything from remorse to arrogance.
Konchak’s varying reactions go from disbelief to anger and even to mocking. Then it’s Konchak’s turn to admit she’s been sleeping with a co-worker and Tan’s turn to be everything from hurt to bemused.
There is no question all this is effective theatrically, but it’s still essentially a series of acting exercises. We get to watch as Tan does a scene in high status and then see him switch and do it in low status.
We get to see the actors speaking the same lines sitting, standing and even lying on the floor. It’s clever and funny. There’s a scene with Konchak and Tan switching emotions from anger, melancholy or confusion and we even get to see the same scene done using sign language.
Constellations brought me back to my days as an acting student and teacher where such exercises are basic to learning the craft. I just never thought I’d see them as the basis of a play and all the more credit to Payne for striking on the idea and making it work.
ATP’s Constellations, under the direction of Valerie Planche, works so well because, in Tan and Konchak, we have two immensely talented and versatile actors.
Nothing about their performances seem forced or fabricated.
Marianne is an intellectual with a penchant for cursing and Konchak makes those expletives
seem as natural to her speech as all the scientific jargon about parallel universes and quantum theorems.
There’s a puppy-dog quality that Tan occasionally brings to Roland that is wonderfully disarming and often poignant.
Despite — or maybe because of — the theatrical trickery, I believed in Roland and Marianne’s relationship. In the lobby after the show, I heard people say they had been moved to tears and that is far more to Tan and Konchak’s credit than Payne’s.
David Fraser has created an abstract world for Roland and Marianne which looks like a net and Marianne does refer to the necessity of a safety net.
Fraser’s lighting cues and Dave Clarke’s sound cues make it clear when even the shortest scenes begin and end, and what they achieve for the final moment is hauntingly beautiful.
Planche does not allow the play to become static nor does she impose action for the sake of action because she is far more interested in the emotions at the heart of the relationship.