LONE JOURNEYS 

(A play)

Conceived by Jacklyn Kuan
Texts written by Ellison Tan
Center 42, Singapore
2016-08-28

Directed and devised by Jacklyn Kuan
Actors: Alvin Koh, Akiko Otao, Kailin Yong

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A Review by Hawk Liu

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The performance space was truly a black, square box with 10-15 chairs in each corner for the audience. 3 actors told their stories through a series of narrations, dialogues and physical interactions with each other. Dressed totally in white, they did an admirable job, serving the devised play well with their unfaltering physical acting, range of emotions and precision of delivery, albeit slightly speedy in some of the texts for comprehension.
The play itself was more like a psychological examination of the lives of 3 humans caught in a machine world. Although an interesting concept, the abstract approach may not appeal to everyone. The narratives in many places tend to be long drawn out and many long silences didn't help to move the story along. The abstract physicalities sometimes left me wondering what was happening. Also, there was the insufficient interaction with the machine world. It could have made more sense to me if I could see more of their relationship with the machine world in order to empathize with their states of being. Their dream of the human world was not urgent, as a result. To some extent, yes, I have felt their journeys, but I am not sure whether they mattered to me at all. As a result, I didn't like the play.

As a note, the actors had no part in the development of the play as mentioned erroneously in the program sheet.

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Also published at http://the-mad-scene.blogspot.sg/2016/08/lone-journeys-by-in-source-theatre-in.html