POETIC LICENSE
Featuring Erika Batdorf. Written by Erika Batdorf. Directed by Todd
Hammond. Presented by Moleman Productions. To Mar 2. Wed-Sat 8pm; Sun
2pm. $25; Sun PWYC. Factory Theatre Studio, 125 Bathurst. 416-504-9971.
www.factorytheatre.ca.
Moving effortlessly from dry comedy to a gorgeous movement piece, Poetic License is a warmhearted, well-crafted theatrical essay on desire. Erika Batdorf plays three characters: tightly wound creative writing professor Marti, her partially paralyzed sister Kathryn and their confused guardian angel. Even Batdorf’s afterlife doesn’t necessarily offer relief from earthly cravings.
Having just received 26 poorly written essays on Jack Kerouac as a radical (read: drugged) poet, Marti delivers a lecture that begins with acerbic wit and hilariously degenerates until Marti reveals what’s actually bothering her. Unfulfilled by her job and unable to connect with her troubled daughter, she’s considering walking out on her obligations in order to discover what her passion is. Batdorf has a massive but approachable presence, making the show’s forays into audience participation feel both natural and non-threatening.
Batdorf’s background in movement work is obvious in her portrayal of Marti’s sister Kathryn, who has been bedridden for 25 years with multiple sclerosis. The scene balances Kathryn’s long, frustrating struggle to sit upright against her sense of humour as she begs for possibly fatal food from a new nurse. Here Batdorf imagines longing as a life giving force rather than a destructive liability, though Marti and Kathryn’s cigarette-smoking guardian angel regrets her own inability to reach a compromise between fulfilling her desires and meeting her obligations.
Following the advice of Artaud, as quoted earlier by Marti, the show moves from “words about words” into the realm of pure action in Kathryn’s movement sequence. Kathryn’s trembling gradually transforms into motion closer to fluttering, and under Julia Vandergraaf’s flickering light arrangement there’s a powerful suggestion of transcendence through radical presence rather than escape. It’s a stunning and absorbing performance in its entirety, and Batdorf’s unconventional picture of the afterlife is delicious food for thought — as are the cookies she distributes.