CHINVAT, THE NINTH BRIDGE. To 24 August.
Edinburgh - Fringe
CHINVAT, THE NINTH BRIDGE
by Gabor Goda
Artus, Hungary at Theatre Workshop, Hamilton Terrace To 24 August 2002
5.15pm
Runs 55min No interval
TICKETS 0131 226 5425
Review Timothy Ramsden 20 August
A knockout performance from a physical theatre company that will surely come to rate as one of the Fringe's great discoveriesHow wrong can you be? Under my western eyes, this Hungarian production seemed a metaphor of a society and its people reconstructing itself after the shock of a quiet revolution. Perhaps it was coming to it straight from Artus' piece Cain's Hat that induced the notion of something oppressive being lifted off people's head.
But I wasn't sure so I collared a company member and asked. He was very polite, offering up a 'Maybe' before pointing to the image of nine bridges in the Hindu Vedas; the ninth, Chinvat, is the hope of redemption and, suitably for what started out as a dance company,the place where speech is surrendered. Not so good for a critic, though. Maybe, here, I should just shut up.
But I won't. For this is, by any apt criterion, a splendid piece, bold in conception, immaculate in performance. It puts the games-playing triviality of much theatre into a store-cupboard that can be locked and the key swallowed by any one of many commercial managements. Seeing it, you can feel this is what theatre's for.
It never slides across the difficulties of life; the quartet of performers (they work as an ensemble, if often in pairs) are kept under constant strain. Nine ladders spread over the stage; a model figure clambers painfully up a performer's leg, then up one of these ladders. Getting anywhere is not easy. The arduous nature of the paths to re-construction - of self or society - are clear.
And they're echoed in the sheer skill of the actors: balancing, climbing, rotating through image-laden sequences, any one of which might be the memorable achievement of a lesser show.
The need for wisdom's apparent too: the piece begins with a fold-out storybook account of three princes, each given the task of filling a vast state-room within 24 hours. The way to success is the path of enlightenment - not acquiring materials but spreading illumination.
Finally, letters spread across the floor in a disarray which belies the balanced structures preceding it spell out a hopeful message (fashionably bored despair isn't an option in this fine-honed world of energy): the tower falls but the stones are unharmed. Magnificent. More, please.
Performers:
Andrea Nagy, Bea Gold, Tamas Bako, Gabor Goda
Director: Gabor Goda
Music: Xenia Stollar
2002-08-21 11:26:53