Shape-shifting romp has a serious message

The Ridiculous Darkness fearlessly crams sociopolitical satire and humanity into large-scale show;

THE RIDICULOUS DARKNESS

By Wolfram Lotz. Translated by Daniel Brunet. Adapted by Daniel Arnold. Directed by Marisa Emma Smith and Nyla Carpentier. Produced by Alley Theatre in partnership with Neworld Theatre. At the Annex on November 11. Continues until November 19

I doubt you’ll find another 2

show this season that manages to cram as much humanity—in all its dazzling variety—onto the stage as The Ridiculous Darkness.

The oxymoronic title is appropriate. Adapted (by Daniel Arnold, who’s also in the cast) from a radio script by German playwright Wolfram Lotz—which is itself adapted from both Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness and Francis Ford Coppola’s film adaptation, Apocalypse Now—the Ridiculous Darkness is both deadly serious about “the horror” that people inflict on each other in the name of “civilization” and endlessly flippant about how it makes its points.

In Conrad’s novel, Marlow pursues a mysterious Mr. Kurtz; both are representatives of a colonizer culture, encountering the “savages” in an unfamiliar land. Just as Coppola transposed the action of Conrad’s novel from the Congo to Vietnam, Lotz relocates both those texts to “the rainforests of Afghanistan”. This cavalier approach to geography allows German military Sergeant Oliver Pellner and his sidekick, Stefan Dorsch, like their literary predecessors, to travel down a river in pursuit of Deutinger, a military officer gone rogue. Along the river’s banks, Pellner and Dorsch meet various “natives”, including a brass band, a children’s choir, powwow dancers, and street vendors—and suddenly we’re not in Afghanistan, but right in the heart of Vancouver.

Within this shape-shifting, freewheeling structure, colonial power and dominance are a consistent thread: in a long prologue, a Somali pirate on trial in Germany recounts how he and a friend worked and saved money for a fishing boat, only to go out and find the sea empty, depleted by European fleets, “its glowing bottom made not of sand, but of rage”. Oppression is insidious, and not always overtly political: in one powerful scene, we meet a group of “coltan farmers” played by actors with disabilities who reject others’ attempts to label them.

Directors Marisa Emma Smith and Nyla Carpentier exploit the looseness of the play’s structure to shift rapidly between dramatic and emotional textures. The coltan farmers speak with heartfelt passion right after we’ve listened to a series of comically petty complaints from

Wives and Daughters’ strong women soar

a ridiculous officer, for example. An exquisitely colourful and graceful powwow dance is followed by a televangelist-style minister tearing off her vestments to reveal a sexy cowgirl costume. The show unfolds as a constant adventure, sometimes hilarious, sometimes earnest.

A core cast of six actors play multiple roles; in another nod to fluidity, the casting of major characters, like Pellner, Dorsch, and the Somali pirate, is repeatedly switched up. With her firm handle on the play’s absurdity, Amanda Sum is a source of constant delight; her attention to status and rhythm are gifts to the play’s comedy. Miranda Edwards’s quiet naturalism and Emilie Leclerc’s warm sincerity are in tune with the play’s spotlight on injustice. Munish Sharma and Clint Andrew are also solid, and Arnold is always crystal clear, even when voicing the uncertainties of Lotz himself (and wearing a giant cutout of the German playwright’s face).

The spirit of satire spills over into the show’s design, with strategically placed details in Nita Bowerman’s costumes, layers of referentiality in the music chosen by sound designer James Coomber, and the atmospheric textures of John Webber’s lighting.

Clocking in at just over two-anda-half hours, The Ridiculous Darkness sometimes feels like it’s trying to do too many things at once. But it’s doing more things—and different things—than many shows even attempt. For that ambition, for that big, vivid display of humanity, and for its inclusiveness in its efforts to bridge distance and difference with compassion and understanding, I’m grateful.

> KATHLEEN OLIVER WIVES AND DAUGHTERS

Written by Jacqueline Firkins, adapted from the novel by Elizabeth Gaskell. Directed by Courtenay Dobbie. Produced by UBC Theatre. At the Frederic Wood Theatre on November 9. Continues to November 25

There’s a lot to love in UBC Theatre’s 2 newest production, Wives and Daughters. Written by Jacqueline Firkins, adapted from a book of the same name by Elizabeth Gaskell,

The Ridiculous Darkness.

the story focuses on Molly (Sabrina Vellani), a young woman whose life is thrown into disarray when her widowed father remarries.

Molly’s new stepmother, Hyacinth (Natalie Backerman), is overbearing, and obsessed with status, and has a daughter Molly’s age named Cynthia (Daria Banu) who arrives home from boarding school unexpectedly early and not entirely welcome. Molly and Cynthia become fast friends even though they’re markedly different: Molly values truth, honesty, and her independence; Cynthia is beautiful and charming, and almost every man she meets falls in love with her. By the time that Molly realizes she has a crush on her fishing buddy, Roger (Louis Lin), a budding scientist, he’s head over heels for Cynthia. They get engaged, but Cynthia has another secret she’s keeping: she’s actually also promised herself to another man.

Wives and Daughters, the book, was set around 1830, and the play seems to occupy that same time—costume designer Liz Gao does beautiful work—yet much of the content feels thoroughly contemporary, particularly around the idea of what a patriarchal society values in women. When Hyacinth declares that “after a certain age, a daughter becomes an inconvenience,” she says it through gritted teeth. Marriage was the main goal, particularly marrying “well”, and it’s clear that Hyacinth herself has internalized the words she bitterly spits out at her daughter and stepdaughter.

Though it sags a tiny bit in the middle, and could probably be about 15 minutes shorter, Wives and Daughters is incredibly funny and charming, full of bracing oneliners and biting wit. This is a tribute to both the writing—the fusion of Gaskell’s early feminist inclinations and Firkins’s sharply comedic talent—and to Courtenay Dobbie’s direction of the largely wonderful cast. As headstrong Molly, Vellani is a standout thanks to her winning combination of heart and humour. Backerman brings depth and hilarity to Hyacinth’s cuttingly funny, casual cruelty. Shona Struthers and Heidi Upham also bring great physical comedy to spinster sisters, Phoebe and Dorothy Browning, who have been looking out for Molly since the death of her mother.

Wives and Daughters takes its female characters and their lives seriously, and it’s an incredibly satisfying and gratifying thing to see on-stage. Here, love isn’t about the guy getting the girl, but about the girl finding the courage to be honest with herself, a journey with which almost every woman can identify.

> ANDREA WARNER

and Daughters. Wives