Out of a collaborative "collision," England's Theatre de Complicite creates an extraordinary evening of sounds and furies. As conceived and directed by Simon McBurney, and devised by the company, "Mnemonic," at the John Jay College Theater, interweaves personal stories with historical events to construct a human continuum of past and present.
Complicite, presenter of "The Three Lives of Lucie Cabrol" and "The Street of Crocodiles," is a cooperative whose distinctive physical and emotional style comes from its working together as, unfortunately, no American company does on a regular basis. Although there is a published script, this is not a production that is easily duplicated.
A plot summary is merely the thread into the labyrinth of an event that demands viewing for full impact. On one level it concerns Alice, whose search for her father takes her to Eastern Europe and finally to Bolzano, Italy, which also happens to be where a museum preserves the remains of a man found frozen in the mountains for 5,000 years. Guiding her via cell phone is the Dantean figure of Virgil, her lover.
Scientists examining the frozen body to discover its origins are juxtaposed with Alice trying to ferret out the secrets of her past. Parallels accrete slowly but inexorably as connections erase time and space and characters are stripped down, literally and figuratively. "Seeing a naked body of any age, we remember our own" leads to the moving epiphany of this remarkable work.
Katrin Cartlidge is Alice, with McBurney as both the frozen man and Virgil. They are supported by a group of actors--Tim McMullan, Eric Mallett, Kostas Philippoglou, Catherine Schaub Abkarian, and Daniel Wahl--who brilliantly create a United Nations of languages and characterizations. As vital to the evening's considerable success are Michael Levine (set), Paul Anderson (lighting), Christina Cunningham (costumes), and Christopher Shutt (sound).