大象传媒

I went to see a play in an apartment at the weekend. It was on the 17^th floor of the Obel Tower, Belfast, spacious, luxurious, ensuite in the master bedroom with spectacular views of Belfast Lough. I sound like an estate agent. We gathered in the lobby as residents went to and fro. Or were they? I started to question whether everyone was part of the play. But, in fairness, I think they were just people who lived in the apartment block. We were invited to come up to the apartment about 15 mins before the play started. It was a one woman show, 鈥淩equest Programme鈥�, from Cork based company Corcadorca, and we were told to have a look around. So we had a bit of a snoop. Family photos, books, copies of Hello magazine, a packet of Chocolate Kimberleys in the cupboard. I toyed with the idea of making a cup of coffee and leaving the cup in the sink with the unwashed dishes. And then the 鈥渙wner 鈥� of the flat came home. Played by Catherine Walsh, 鈥淩equest Programme鈥� is without words. We watch this woman go about her evening rituals once she has come home from work. We watched her do the dishes in the kitchen and put on the kettle. We followed her into the bedroom while she took off her work clothes. We followed her back into the kitchen while she made a cup of tea and watched the tv for a bit. We stood outside the bathroom door while she did a pee. We watched as she worked on a quilt she was making. We were there as she brushed her teeth and washed her face and got into bed. She turned out the light and we sat in the dark while she lay in the bed. And then the light was on, we were there when she got up, went back into the kitchen, took out a bottle of pills and washed them down with a small bottle of bubbly. The End.

It was compelling and slightly hypnotic to be there, in this space, with no words, watching this actress act out the loneliness of a woman who finds her life so听 unbearable she commits suicide. It鈥檚 just that the end was too sudden for me. The lights came up and the drama ended, just moments into taking the pills. I was left thinking the director could have dragged it out a bit more, taken us back into the bedroom, left us in the dark with her, making us uncomfortable, heightening our sense of complicity at watching her for a final time.听

Then it struck me today, this play is 40 years old. Written in German in 1971 by Franz Xaver Kroetz, it must have been shocking to witness the breakdown of another human being in such an intimate way 40 years ago. But when I walked into that apartment on Saturday night in Belfast to see it, I was bringing with me the baggage of life today. While I turned the 鈥渘oise鈥� off, phone to silent, no texting, tweeting, status updating during the play, I was almost innured to the message of the play. This is the generation of watching people 24/7 in a house filled with cameras for a tv show. This is the generation that tells 鈥渇riends鈥� in cyberspace the highs and lows of their lives in 147 characters. This is the generation that takes it for granted that they will see images of a dead dictator on the internet moments after his death.

Watching a woman take her own life in a 1971 play seemed less shocking. But that鈥檚 what has shocked me the most. Not the play, but my own reaction to it.