Fragments

Yesterday's trip to Marine Parade was made in order to see Sanctuary, a piece performed by The Necessary Stage in collaboration with a group from Tokyo, Hanchu-Yuei, co-written by Haresh Sharma & Suguru Yamamoto, the latter being the director of the Tokyo group. According to the publicity blurb it investigates the fragility of the human condition, at a time when technology is eroding our humanity. We are the data, but the data is never ours. So all very hip and featuring impressive production values despite its small scale nature (being performed in the Black Box at Marine Parade Library.)

I was glad we took our drama guys along as it was such a good example of directors, writers and performers trying to do something brave and edgy, and sometimes succeeding. Good questions were asked regarding the threats posed by technology and if were younger I might have felt inclined to try to answer them. As it was I felt a wee bit detached from proceedings, reflective of the distance I keep between myself and the cyber-world. But I imagine the subject matter would have been desperately relevant to those younger and hipper than I. The very notion of a kind of fragmentary theatre, made up of ideas from all involved is exciting, but the danger is that the result might not transcend the process, and I thought this was a bit of a problem with Sanctuary. For all of its promise it ended up as a fascinating puzzle rather than a fully achieved, coherent piece.

Perhaps this all relates to the challenge of the fragmented times in which we live?