Written
Robert Lepage, Frédérike Bédard et al. Directed by Robert Lepage.
Featuring Rebecca Blankenship, Rick Miller. Presented by Ex
Machina/Théâtre Sans Frontières. In English, French, German, Spanish
and Polish with English surtitles. Jun 9, 10 & 11 (performed in three parts over three nights, each starting at 7pm); Jun 13 & 14 (complete nine-hour performance starting 1pm). $75-$125. Bluma Appel Theatre, 27 Front E.
416-872-1111. www.luminato.com Robert Lepage’s epic multilingual drama Lipsynch
is having its North American premiere in Toronto as part of the
Luminato Festival. Audiences have the choice of seeing the nine-part
play over the course of three evenings or in an all-day marathon
lasting from 1pm-9:30pm including four intermissions and a 45-minute
meal break. For devotees of Lepage and of experimental theatre this
unquestionably a must-see event.
Yet, even they will have to admit
that the work pales in comparison to Lepage’s previous epic, The Seven Streams of the River Ota (1994). The first four parts of Lipsynch
are absolutely mind-blowing in their combination of ideas, drama and
theatricality. Sadly, none of the following five parts reaches this
extraordinarily high level, with only part 9 making a partial return to
it.
Each
of the nine parts is named for one of the drama’s nine central
figures. The story begins with Ada (Rebecca Blankenship), an Austrian
opera singer, who finds herself on a flight during which a teenaged
Nicaraguan woman with a baby dies. In an improbable move crucial to
the entire plot, Ada finds the baby (somehow not in foster care) and
adopts him. We next move to Thomas (Hans Piesbergen), a German
neurologist, now in a relationship with Ada, who is forced to tell
a Quebecois jazz singer she has a brain tumour and faces a dangerous
operation. The next focus is this singer, Marie (Frédéricke Bédard),
as she conquers her temporary aphasia. Finally, we meet Jeremy (Rick
Miller), now a filmmaker, who is shooting a film with a bickering
international cast based on the life of his birth mother.
At
this point the show veers badly into the banal. Part 5 about Sarah
(Sarah Kemp), the caretaker of Ada’s aged speech therapist, tries one’s
patience with its overuse of BBC news broadcasts. The coarsely comic
Part 6 about the return of sound technician Sebastián (Carlos Belda) to
Tenerife to bury his father is totally irrelevant. Part 7 about
Jackson (John Cobb), a detective investigating the death of Sarah’s
brother, is like a below-average British crime show. Part 8 about
Michelle (Lise Castonguay), Marie’s schizophrenic sister, is
dramatically potent in itself but still a detour from the central
action. In Part 9, Lepage returns to form focussing on harrowing short
life of Jeremy’s birth mother Lupe (Nurcia Garcia), but ultimately requires a deus ex machina in the form of a lesbian
documentary filmmaker to patch up large plot holes.
Lepage claims that Lipsynch
is a study of the human voice. The polyglot text, reference to
aphasia, use of singing from opera to rap, multiple displays of
recording, lipsyching, film dubbing and mime unite the nine parts. The
show, however, is really about the capacity or even desire of the human
brain to combine and mould the diverse particles of reality into a
coherent picture. Lepage demonstrates this in the most breathtaking
fashion in Part 2 where the set consists of what seem to be random bits
and pieces which, when viewed by a video camera at the correct angle,
create the projected optical illusion of a solid set. All the best
stagecraft is linked to this idea.
In Part 1 Jean Hazel’s
brilliantly-conceived set modules combine and recombine in moments to
form an airplane, a train and the London Tube. In Part 4 Lepage
applies the method of filming Jeremy’s movie on breakaway sets to
Jeremy’s off-set life so that we move into meta-theatrical wonderland
with a play about filming a movie about filming a movie. It’s not
surprising that Lepage’s prodigious imagination should fail him for the
inconsequential Parts 5-8.
The
cast members, each having to act and sing in at least three languages
are simply amazing, though Rick Miller really stands out for submerging
himself so fully into his multiple roles. If Lipsynch
does not fully succeed, at its best it features astonishing sequences
like none you’ve ever seen before that expand what theatre can do and
the means of expression it can use.