Theatre offers a platter of capabilities. It can be a challenge to select choice A as opposed to choice B, when both seem to open up a riveting space for exploration. That being said, it must be admitted that the Irish premiere of Neil Bartlett’s In Extremis went the proper route more times than it didn’t—and that’s the greatest comment I could make. It was my first time attending a show in the Bewley’s Café Theatre, and it was a thorough treat. The process of entering was streamlined and hassle-free. Chairs and tables were arranged in a casual fashion within a room at the uppermost point of the building. I was given a chair centred in that arrangement. Perhaps I had the best view. The set design was rather minimalist, with only a handful of props decorating the small stage. Luscious wine-red curtains were draping behind these few props, already preparing the audience for a play composed of mystique. The show would depict a private meeting conducted between a palm-reader and her patient—the overpowering Oscar Wilde—sometime in 1895. It contained one act, lasting roughly fifty minutes. This runtime allowed the audience to experience the events depicted as though they were participants in the meeting itself, instead of bloating the show out with needless material that would only establish distance between the audience and the performance.
After a brief introduction and safety warning, we are introduced immediately to Mrs. Robinson, the palm-reader. For a play featuring Oscar Wilde as its joint protagonist, I was taken aback by the well-rounded delivery executed by Gene Rooney as Robinson. She expertly sculpts this character into an allusive figure, simultaneously appearing both in control and in doubtless disarray. The certainty of each passing moment is held in her palm, as she alone asserts the verifiability of this narrative to the audience. Without delay, her outfit immersed one in the space they wished to create, alongside her gestural command, precise gait, and proud flourishes. This is not to say that Colm Hanratty was lacklustre as Oscar Wilde. In fact, he was also far greater than I had anticipated. Wilde is a tricky personality to depict beyond caricature, but he pulls it off. Much of this may be attributed to the finely-tuned script, which succeeds at keeping Wilde at an arm’s length. However, a script only shines under the light of careful acting. Hanratty carries his figure with composed relish, revelling in the act while maintaining an air of inscrutability and fathomless sorrow throughout. As he scrunches his face in Wildean exuberance, one is expected to dissect each wrinkle for some semblance of consciousness, for a thought process. This complimented the play’s overarching concern: the (in)ability to sift through an artist’s apparel, demeanour and cadence for trinkets of insight—indeed, the process of dissecting an artist for meaning. With that material, Hanratty thrives.
The venue played a pivotal role in efficiently constituting a sense of secrecy and revelation. One feels at a level with the characters on stage, as if one is a voyeur gazing through a forbidden keyhole. The script ensures that one remains aware of the play’s existence in history. Indeed, one is always cognisant of the fact that a meeting of this kind may have occurred, but that the actors, along with the playwright and director, were most certainly absent from it. The play is therefore an act of speculation. Its production is an act of voyeurism in and of itself. This involves the audience even further, as one feels like an investigator on par with the man who wrote the words being spoken on stage. Death looms over the entire production, which constantly reminds one of the fact that Wilde has been dead for well over a century. His thoughts are an irretrievable artefact that nobody can ever witness. To see a production wrestle with this dilemma was engaging and intriguing from start to finish. The show itself felt like a seance of sorts, and all of us in attendance had paid tickets to a medium for answers, for a peek behind Wilde’s curtain. This was expertly executed.
All of that being said, the play oftentimes felt more experiential than engrossing. Both characters are little more than puppets for this engaging theatrical experiment. Rooney’s palm-reader certainly entranced the audience, but one was left wondering if she had any potential rotundity to her soul beyond occupying the role of an unreliable narrator. The same is true for Wilde, whose character centrally relies upon the audience’s awareness of his rise and fall. Much of his dialogue signals simply towards key moments in his life without delving into them. The play’s best quality is the enigmatic flavour sewn throughout its crevices, but this can sometimes undercut its emotional effectiveness.
Despite this, the drama stunned me as a sleek discussion prodding at death, identity, and memory. Joan Sheehy, the director of this production, refined the material she was working within until it became a true success. Her actors were well-utilised, and their astounding presence carried the show. I was left mesmerised by the intricacy of the production, and was awestruck by the venue’s silent beauty. I will be returning, and I recommend that you do too. For the best part of an hour, I was privy to the innermost world of a wonderful artist. What’s more is that it permitted a kind of retrospection regarding my own fate, and you can’t ask for better than that.
