Review: Victory Condition - Royal Court
Reviews are extremely mixed for this new work from Chris Thorpe. Critics swing between "brilliant" and "baffled", and, from my experience, audiences are feeling the same. I have to admit it has taken me a while - I didn't want to write something immediately, needing time to think about what I had seen, and now I think I'm erring on the 'brilliant' swing of the pendulum.
I wouldn't say that I enjoyed it, though, but I do think that Victory Condition will come to be seen as the first play that defines an era, in the same way that Look Back In Anger and Blasted came to. Thorpe says that this play is "An attempt to get to grips with the fact that everything happens at once." and yes, it is an attempt. It may not be to everyone's taste or sensibilities, but surely that's the point of challenging theatre? Not everyone will accept, or be up to, the challenge.
On the one hand it is an incredibly well done piece of hyper-naturalistic acting. Under the direction of Vicky Feathrstone, Jonjo O'Neill and Sharon Duncan-Brewster weave around each other in their small flat in that smooth, unthinking manner that comes with knowing another person inside-out. They unpack from a holiday, make food, drink tea, drink wine, order pizza... it is a simple snapshot of millions of lives in millions of identikit showroom apartments across the world. The way in which they interact with each other reflects the reflexive passage of our daily lives (have you ever considered, with the sheer volume of bodies moving down a city street, the relative infrequency of collisions? We walk without thinking and smooth our ways around each other.)
However, on the other hand, it is an extended duo-monologue: an epic poem for one, with the speech sections weaving around each other even as the actors bodies do. For all of O'Neill and Duncan-Brewster's physical familiarity, their spoken words are directed to the audience, never to each other.
This beautiful disconnect is a manifestation of the detachment of modern life, in which we spend the time we're physically with someone actually talking (typing) to people across the world on our phones, tablets, or laptops.
The two monologues are starkly different: a couple of reviewers have tried to find a concrete dramaturgy beneath the mountain of words, assigning 'jobs' and 'storylines' to the chunks of speech. I don't think that it is that simple; rather it called to mind those meandering, jumbled thoughts that flow through our heads when we are doing something ingrained and familiar. I think it is too simplistic to say that the Man and Woman, as shown, have a direct association to their story-speech. Man speaks for a sniper sighting a revolutionary through his cross-hairs. Woman speaks of a transcendental experience, or mental breakdown, in an office.
A victory condition, as I understand it, is something to do with gaming, and the steps a player takes in order to 'win'. The set, by Chloe Lamford, made me think of a computer or television screen: a too-bright box suspended in mid-air by utilitarian scaffolding. In a capitalist, consumerist society, we are conditioned to think of 'winning'. Is this what a win looks like? A shiny flat, a nice partner? The ability to close the door and turn off the television.
The point is, I think, that, as Thorpe states, everything happens at once. We can be sat in our little boxes, ordering pizza and drinking wine, while, simultaneously connected and removed from the world: we watch revolutions and sip our tea, we hear stories of slavery and abuse, shake our heads and flick the screen to a computer game. In its fluid and disrupted dramaturgy, Victory Condition shows us that everything happens everywhere and nowhere because we can 'turn it off'.
We are simultaneously instantly connected to everyone, on social media, online news, etc, which is conveyed through directly addressing the audience; and disconnected from everyone, shown, I feel, in the actors familiar yet silent interactions with each other. Critics have criticised the sense of helplessness at the end: if the world is doomed to end with a whimper, as we queue and squabble, and prices rise and revolutions fail, and we sit in our box and shake our heads at it all, then tell us what can we do about it. However, the second of recognition, the verbal connection between the actors, right at the end, is, for me, the answer. Connection. Actual human connection is what will save us. Not this safe remove, not this acknowledging but not understanding. Connection and recognition is the answer.
For me Victory Condition is a play for a new generation, and Thorpe has indeed made a valiant "attempt".
I wouldn't say that I enjoyed it, though, but I do think that Victory Condition will come to be seen as the first play that defines an era, in the same way that Look Back In Anger and Blasted came to. Thorpe says that this play is "An attempt to get to grips with the fact that everything happens at once." and yes, it is an attempt. It may not be to everyone's taste or sensibilities, but surely that's the point of challenging theatre? Not everyone will accept, or be up to, the challenge.
On the one hand it is an incredibly well done piece of hyper-naturalistic acting. Under the direction of Vicky Feathrstone, Jonjo O'Neill and Sharon Duncan-Brewster weave around each other in their small flat in that smooth, unthinking manner that comes with knowing another person inside-out. They unpack from a holiday, make food, drink tea, drink wine, order pizza... it is a simple snapshot of millions of lives in millions of identikit showroom apartments across the world. The way in which they interact with each other reflects the reflexive passage of our daily lives (have you ever considered, with the sheer volume of bodies moving down a city street, the relative infrequency of collisions? We walk without thinking and smooth our ways around each other.)
However, on the other hand, it is an extended duo-monologue: an epic poem for one, with the speech sections weaving around each other even as the actors bodies do. For all of O'Neill and Duncan-Brewster's physical familiarity, their spoken words are directed to the audience, never to each other.
This beautiful disconnect is a manifestation of the detachment of modern life, in which we spend the time we're physically with someone actually talking (typing) to people across the world on our phones, tablets, or laptops.
The two monologues are starkly different: a couple of reviewers have tried to find a concrete dramaturgy beneath the mountain of words, assigning 'jobs' and 'storylines' to the chunks of speech. I don't think that it is that simple; rather it called to mind those meandering, jumbled thoughts that flow through our heads when we are doing something ingrained and familiar. I think it is too simplistic to say that the Man and Woman, as shown, have a direct association to their story-speech. Man speaks for a sniper sighting a revolutionary through his cross-hairs. Woman speaks of a transcendental experience, or mental breakdown, in an office.
A victory condition, as I understand it, is something to do with gaming, and the steps a player takes in order to 'win'. The set, by Chloe Lamford, made me think of a computer or television screen: a too-bright box suspended in mid-air by utilitarian scaffolding. In a capitalist, consumerist society, we are conditioned to think of 'winning'. Is this what a win looks like? A shiny flat, a nice partner? The ability to close the door and turn off the television.
The point is, I think, that, as Thorpe states, everything happens at once. We can be sat in our little boxes, ordering pizza and drinking wine, while, simultaneously connected and removed from the world: we watch revolutions and sip our tea, we hear stories of slavery and abuse, shake our heads and flick the screen to a computer game. In its fluid and disrupted dramaturgy, Victory Condition shows us that everything happens everywhere and nowhere because we can 'turn it off'.
We are simultaneously instantly connected to everyone, on social media, online news, etc, which is conveyed through directly addressing the audience; and disconnected from everyone, shown, I feel, in the actors familiar yet silent interactions with each other. Critics have criticised the sense of helplessness at the end: if the world is doomed to end with a whimper, as we queue and squabble, and prices rise and revolutions fail, and we sit in our box and shake our heads at it all, then tell us what can we do about it. However, the second of recognition, the verbal connection between the actors, right at the end, is, for me, the answer. Connection. Actual human connection is what will save us. Not this safe remove, not this acknowledging but not understanding. Connection and recognition is the answer.
For me Victory Condition is a play for a new generation, and Thorpe has indeed made a valiant "attempt".
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