GOING TO ST. IVES TACKLES THEMES FROM MOTHERHOOD TO COLONIALISM AND RACISM
Big issues are on the table in Going to St. Ives, the new twohander that debuted Thursday at the Varscona, care of the Varscona Theatre Ensemble.
The audience is no sooner settled in their chairs, coats comfortably draped around their shoulders, that the thorny topics of colonialism, torture and racism make themselves awkwardly present. What’s astounding is the way playwright Lee Blessing constructs the conversation between May N’Kame (Patricia Darbasie) and Dr. Cora Gage (Belinda Cornish) in such a way that these overwhelming global concerns find themselves served up in a tiny tête à tête, right alongside herbal tea and scones. When the two are not discussing May’s monstrous son, an African dictator reviled for his bloodthirsty reign, they are comparing notes on Cora’s Blue Willow china.
“Synthetic trash, designed to charm ignorant, middle-class customers,” sniffs May.
“My great-granddad gave it to my great-granny,” says Cora, struggling to keep a defensive tone at bay.
But first, some setup. Cora and May find themselves negotiating an unusual relationship when the latter arrives in a village near Cambridge, England to have an eye operation, care of the former, an internationally renowned surgeon. May has come from an unnamed African country, a former British colony, where she is the mother of the so-called emperor. Concerned for his mother, the despot has sought the best possible treatment for her affliction, to be delivered by Cora.
Here’s where it gets tricky. Sensing an opportunity, Cora, asks May for a favour. Would she consider asking her son to release four doctors he is holding in custody for the crime of refusing to revive torture victims so that they can be tortured again? As a physician, Cora knows this is an unethical request. But she is motivated by complex emotions.
Her seven-year-old son has died, accidentally shot by a black street youth, and she blames herself for his death. Cora’s internal compass is unsettled, she flails about in search of firm ground.
May, who is by turns abrasive, provocative and haughty in the first act, has her own internal struggle. She feels responsible for her son’s ruthless behaviour as a dictator. Even though she knows the tender youth she lovingly raised was virtually destroyed when his father sent him to military school at the age of 10, she wonders if she is responsible for his cruel choices simply by giving birth to him. Turns out Cora isn’t the only one who needs a favour, and the two mothers strike a pact which has unintended, and dramatic, consequences in the second act.
Despite some opening night stumbles, Cornish and Darbasie bring their A game to this show, managing to ride the mighty swells of guilt, fear, anger, passion, love and hate that propel the script. Director Julien Arnold keeps the pace taut throughout, and the dialogue is ferocious. Both characters are intellectually intimidating, and yet what is compelling about their performances are the emotions that make their moral choices so difficult, and so important.
American playwright Lee Blessing, who first staged Going to St. Ives in 1997, has a knack for the dance of personal and political. His best known work, the Pulitzer and Tony-nominated play, A Walk in the Woods, is about the relationship between two arms negotiators. Based on fact, the play mirrors an event that took place in 1982 in Geneva, when a Russian and an American left formal discussions to take a stroll through the forest.
Some 20 years after it was first produced, Going to St. Ives resonates, as some African nations continue to roil as a result of factions created by colonialism.
“The borders drawn by the English made us jail mates, not countrymen,” says May, reflecting on her country’s history. “The nation couldn’t be run; it could only be wrestled over.”
When Cora notes that these things all happened in the past, May is quick to counter with another perspective.
“The past — eternal ravisher of the present, yes?”
You don’t need to go to Africa for those words to chill. This show brings to mind the recent production of Children of God at the Citadel, a story about the colonialism in Canada that affects Indigenous people in this country to this day.
Macro-politics builds the framework for Going to St. Ives. But it’s the micro-moments
— the fine line between love and hate, the sometimes bitter bond of motherhood — that create compelling theatre at the Varscona.
Parents in the audience may not be coping with monstrous behaviour, or tragic shootings, but mothers and fathers alike all understand the weight of responsibility that comes with having children. It may be easy for some folks to turn a blind eye to international politics, or genocides of the past. One’s own home is harder to ignore.