"Faction" Theatre at the Dublin Theatre Festival

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The Dublin Theatre Festivals in 2005 and 2006 featured unforgettable productions inspired by actual events that attracted the media in the countries of origin as well as writers who felt an imperative to theatricalize events and explore multiple perspectives. Powerful two-handers that transformed crimes against children into theatre will be the focus of my presentation:Tshepang from South Africa and Aalst from Belgium. In Tshepang the crime concerns the rape of a 9 month-old baby, who survives horrific injuries. The play refuses the revenge model, explores the context, and never simplistically demonizes the perpetrator or the mother. Instead throughout the play a dichotomy exists between the silent mother's rubbing of salt into animal skins and the prodigious story telling of a male friend, who protects her. Spectators eschew the conventional response of villainy and ask instead how oppressive societal structures of apartheid and their ramifications have affected the lives of the marginalized and victimized. In contrast to this performative storytelling mode, Aalst offers an hour-long searing review of the case against parents who admit to killing their children. Using voice-over cross-examination of the parents, the play combines documentary, fact and fiction to trace their abusive childhoods and to place the murderes in a context that foregrounds their problematic lives and relationships. Spectators are left with deeply troubling questions about the legal system, social services and the lack of caring in the community. Both these plays foreground specific communities but the theatrical transformations transcend space and time and powerfully urge spectators to grapple with disturbing images and complex societal issues that relate to their own worlds.

Stream: Art in Communities

Paper: A paper has not yet been submitted.

Marcia Blumberg specializes in Contemporary Theatre. She has a PhD (Constructions of Women in South African theatre) and did postdoctoral work at the Open University (UK) on theatrical representations of HIV/AIDS. She worked at the Open University as a South African theatre Fellow and teaches at York University in Toronto. She is on the Advisory Committee for the Dublin Theatre Festival and has been involved with Harbourfront Centre in Toronto for many years in various capacities but specially with performing arts.