 Crave by Sarah Kane Brings Festive Longing to the Shadowbox Theatre by Michael K. Potter What do you want? This is the question at the heart of Crave, the celebrated play by controversial British playwright Sarah Kane. It’s a question that could be asked of anyone, and no matter who you ask there will be a lot of answers. Some will come quickly. Some will take a little more time. The deeper answers – the real answers – will require some interrogation and reflection and a lot of vulnerability. Kane’s script is abstract, with characters represented by letters rather than names, with no stage directions or story built in. So it leaves a lot of room for directors and actors to interpret. As a result, every production of Crave is utterly unique. Our vision of Crave is a family Christmas party, set in London, where Kane lived. This is a family that doesn’t get together very often. Maybe they haven’t come together for the holidays in many years. For some people Christmas is a time of joy and warmth and a welcome opportunity to spend time with loved ones they miss. For other people, Christmas is. . . challenging. After all, it tends to stir up a lot of memories. Memories of those who’ve passed away and can’t be with us for the holidays. Memories of old hurts and slights and failures. And Christmas tends to remind us of our longings, our deepest longings and cravings and desires. The longings that we’re able to push down and bury and ignore for most of the year often surface at Christmas, whether we like it or not. Some of these we may have felt for many years, perhaps even going back to our childhoods. What does that mean? It means that thing, whatever it is we long for, we still don’t have. Are we ready to face that fact? Do we want to be reminded of deep longings that have never been satisfied – and maybe never will be satisfied? The result, for many people, is raw and brutal loneliness. Christmas is a lonely time of year for more people than you may realize. If this surprises you, perhaps it’s because you’re not one of them. For others this won’t come as a surprise at all. The family in Crave endures a Christmas gathering that might remind you in some ways of your own. Family members say the same things they said last year, and the year before, and the year before that. Hasn’t anything new happened to them since last Christmas? Sometimes they say the same things to you that they said fifteen minutes earlier – or they say them to new people as they move around the room, maybe hoping for a different kind of response. But they don’t seem to get the response they’re hoping for, so the loop continues. Your mother corners people to tell them rambling stories they don’t want to hear. One of your uncles clearly pines for your mother, as he has for decades, and though she keeps rejecting him, as she has for decades, she clearly enjoys the attention. One of your cousins obviously doesn’t want to be there, so he moves around the room like a ghost, dodging conversations and distracting himself with whatever’s available. Another cousin, or maybe it’s your sister, seems to have decided that this Christmas she’s ready to reveal the darkest memories she’s been hiding. But no one hears her. Maybe they don’t want to admit they hear her. Maybe what she’s saying is too much for them to hear. Another uncle still hides his darkest secret, not realizing that he’s the only one who thinks it’s a secret. Everyone else knows what he’s done, and they know that he doesn’t know that they know. And for this family, and maybe yours, there’s a black hole at the center of these festivities: a family member who’s been gone for too long, who was taken too young, whose emptiness fills the space between each person present. His absence threatens to suffocate the living. Is this what every Christmas party is like for the family in Crave? How many times have they done this? How many more times will it happen? Will the future be any different from the present – much less the past? But in some ways there is an important difference this Christmas because as these family members drink a little too much, old grudges and resentments are revealed with a ferocity glossed over in previous years by the demands of etiquette. This leads to confrontations. And these confrontations lead each of these people to speak with an honesty and vulnerability and bluntness they’ve never demonstrated before. So Post Productions’ version of Crave can be summed up as the most uncomfortable family Christmas party you’ll ever see. Hopefully far more uncomfortable than any Christmas you’ve ever experienced in your own life. But there’s more. This is Christmas 1975, the heart of the Me Decade. The 1970s, in my opinion, was the most interesting decade of the 20th century. It was a decade of artistic and cultural explosions – new ways of thinking, new forms of visual art, new musical genres, new approaches to filmmaking, new approaches to television, new approaches to journalism. The novel, which had become stultified, entered a period of rebirth as authours shook themselves free from the shackles of “this is the way it’s done”. New forms of architecture flourished. And the 1970s was famously the decade of sexual liberation. Theatre, too, scattered in all directions and many new playwrights found themselves celebrated for extremes – whether extremes of naturalism at one end or surrealism at the other. And of course we can’t forget the politics of the 1970s, which were wildly shaken up in both Canada and the United States. Nor can we forget the violence, as this was the decade of the serial killers, the Vietnam War, the height of airplane hijackings, proxy wars and regime changes orchestrated by the CIA in Central America and the Middle East, and the significant rise in street violence and the power of drug cartels. But most interesting to me – and most relevant to our production of Crave – the 1970s were cosmopolitan and eclectic when it came to religion and philosophy, ways of perceiving and interpreting and interacting with the world. Not only did new religions and cults proliferate in this decade, many regular mainstream people began to take a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure approach to religion. The old ways were breaking apart but people still longed for meaning. They longed for purpose. They longed for answers to life’s biggest questions. They longed for reassurance that something awaited them when they left this world. So they cobbled together their own ad hoc spiritualities by picking bits and pieces from established religions, mixing in ideas from various philosophies and social sciences, then (as has always been the case) interpreting the result in a way that made their own biases and prejudices seem grounded in the fabric of the universe. When you enter the auditorium of the Shadowbox Theatre to find your seat, you’ll notice this religious and cultural hodgepodge immediately. The walls are adorned with the symbols of many religions from all corners of the world, yet anchored to the Christian holiday celebrated on December 25th. The lights of a Christmas tree shine at the back of the room, close to the bar, not far from a Star of David and an Ankh. . . and a framed photograph of Aleister Crowley. What does this family believe? Everything? Isn’t that the same as believing in nothing? Isn’t that just treating religion and spirituality as costume jewelry? There is a certain nihilism to people who seem to believe in everything all at once, because it’s only possible to think you believe in everything if you don’t take any of those beliefs seriously. A moment’s reflection will reveal contradictions, things that cannot possibly be true simultaneously. And that implies cynicism as well. Someone who thinks they believe in everything, or proclaims they believe in everything, is aware on some level that they don’t take any of it seriously. When you get right down to it what they truly believe is that nothing is true. This sort of nihilist and cynic is someone who can’t be trusted. They’re disingenuous and self-deceptive. We can only trust those who care about truth and are sincere in their beliefs. So the set of Crave – what you see when you enter the room – is already communicating something to you long before any characters open their mouths. Yet, Kane’s play is neither nihilistic nor cynical. Some of the characters might be. Even then. . . only sometimes. Because as you listen to them you’ll come to understand just how sincere these people are, and their sincerity haunts them. It drives them apart even though they yearn to be close to each other. They have hurt each other and been hurt by each other so many times over so many years that their sincerity and honesty are dismissed. They’ve developed the habit of not listening to each other. They’ve developed the habit of not trusting each other. They’ve developed the habit of seeing each other as perpetrators and enemies, and of seeing themselves as victims. And when you interpret the world through the lens of a victim-perpetrator binary, one that sorts all people into one category or the other, you’ve cut yourself off from the possibility of true love and all that comes with it. Have you ever tried to communicate with someone standing right next to you only to find they can’t understand you because their mind is in a different time and place than their body? That’s what’s happening to the characters in Crave. They’re all physically present with each other in this room, but their minds are living in various memories, some from the distant past, and in hopes set in futures they fantasize about occupying. Consequently none of them are ever really at the same place in the same slice of time. They’re uncomfortable with where they are. They fidget. They continually leave conversations before they’re finished. They can’t sit still. They pace – often to grab another drink they probably don’t even want. It’s just that getting up to retrieve a drink gives them an excuse to leave. Once they have it, they return – and then what? They’re still uncomfortable. They’re ghosts to themselves and each other. Restless hungry ghosts whose appetites can never be satiated. Ghosts who aren’t even sure what it is they’re hungry for. Even if these characters aren’t literally ghosts, pay close attention when you see Crave. Watch the space between them. Watch how infrequently they touch, make actual contact with each other – and watch how those they touch react. Sometimes these moments will help you understand what they’re saying at that point in time. Sometimes their physical reactions seem to contradict what they say. Until the next moment, when it all seems to come together for better or worse. They crave contact because they crave connection. But like ghosts they’re unable to connect. This is why they suffer, at least in part. The other reason they suffer is the answer to this question: why do they need to connect with each other at all? There’s no other play in the world quite like Crave. As Eve Allin observed, “Crave is a visual poem: lines finishing before they’ve barely begun, sliding out of mouths and crashing onto the moving floor. Words pile on top of each other like bodies, each one obscuring the next, each one giving new weight to the last”. And then, just as you think these characters are doomed to talk over and past each other forever, just as you think there’s no possibility of hope for them, things change. “Now imagine that serendipity steps in, and these conversations coalesce in a strikingly poetic way, a fantasia of love, lust, pain, humor, sadness, hope, resignation” says Les Gutman. He’s right. When Post Productions produced Sarah Kane’s first play, Blasted, in 2021, we became only the fourth theatre company in Canadian history ever to produce that play – which is odd, considering how famous it is. Crave – which Kane initially released under a pseudonym to avoid the prejudice caused by the notoriety of her previous plays – marks our third production of her work. We are now the only Canadian theatre company that has produced three of her plays. To us, this is a badge of honour. Her work is provocative, challenging, emotionally intense, insightful, and frankly kind of terrifying for the cast and crew involved. But it’s worth it. Producing a Sarah Kane play is like nothing else – it’s exhausting and bewildering and frightening and absolutely worth the hundreds of hours of work involved. And as those who saw our productions of Blasted and 4.48 Psychosis can attest, it gives the audience an experience unlike anything else they’ve ever had or ever will have. Crave by Sarah Kane will be performed at The Shadowbox Theatre (1501 Howard ave., corner of Howard & Shepherd, Windsor, Ont.) December 5, 6, 11, 12, 13, 18, 19 & 20, 2025. Showtime 8:00 PM (doors open 7:30). Tickets can be purchased for $20 for the first weekend of performances (Dec. 5 & 6), $25 for the second weekend (Dec. 11, 12 & 13), and $30 for the third and final weekend (Dec. 18, 19 & 20) via www.postproductionswindsor.ca or at the door (cash, debit, or credit card) if seats are still available. Starring Camryn S. Kingsley, Mitch Snaden, Fay Lynn, Michael K. Potter, Nikolas Prsa, and Amisha Paradva. Written by Sarah Kane. Directed and produced by Michael K. Potter and Fay Lynn. Set design and construction by Fay Lynn. Poster and program designed by Kris Simic. Presented by Post Productions. 
0 Comments
|