EVERY BRILLIANT THING Play Review

Deepa Punjani	Host-A-Performance \| Schedule

Direction : Quasar Thakore Padamsee Writer : Duncan Macmillan & Jonny Donahoe Cast : Vivek Madan

EVERY BRILLIANT THING Review

Mental health conditions can be very tough. Our more common reactions tend to be facile and nearly always sympathetic. We even pretend to understand, but only those of us who have been through a mental health issue, really know. We know it when we are in it or when we see a loved one live through it. The latter is perhaps even worse depending on the severity of the condition. Entire families can be scarred. Children are particularly vulnerable when they have to deal with a chronic depressive parent, like the child in Duncan Macmillan and Jonny Donahoe's EVERY BRILLIANT THING. The solo play has been adapted to an Indian context; it has been thoughtfully directed by Quasar Thakore Padamsee, and is touchingly performed by Vivek Madan.

The actor brings an endearing quality to his narrative and has a very likeable and affable persona but his trajectory is cliched. It is sweet but hardly nuanced. It is hopeful but it does not show us how hopeless it can indeed be. We can be redeemed like the little boy and his moving 'lists'; they can be stirring as they range from the prosaic to the more thoughtful; from childhood references to more adult ponderings, but the catharsis is suppressed.

The point of view is the child's and is further explored in an interactive form of theatre in which the audience actively participates. In a 'controlled' way, the audience even shapes the narrative, and so each performance would be unique to that extent. There are pros and cons about this approach. The interactive model of theatre (and the play is a good example because it is highly interactive), has at least two shortcomings if not perfectly calibrated. It can become lazy as it passes on the writer's burden to the audience and it presupposes that the audience will be up to the task. As a matter of fact it could be debilitating to the original intention. Since there is chance that is built into this model, and which is also restrictive after a fashion, there is little opportunity for complexity. Mental health is a complex subject.

The play has its more reflective and philosophical moments such as the allusion to the German writer Goethe in the context of suicide, or to the music that makes this child and young man's life more bearable. As he goes through the predictable phase of meeting his girl and then marriage and separation, the list dwindles, but the hope remains. The child and later the young man do not wear sentimentality on their sleeve; there is a kind of stoic acceptance and the sadness is subtle. Very early the child learns firsthand in spite of his 'whys' (one of the better moments in this interactive form) the instincts for survival, crippling as his mother's situation is. EVERY BRILLIANT THING as the title then suggests is a story of courage and of a child's coping-up mechanism as he carves out his own, little refuge. It might have had more texture sans the truism.

*Deepa Punjani has been writing on theatre and performance for close to two decades. She represents the Indian National Section of Theatre Critics, which is part of the International Association of Theatre Critics (IATC) that has over 50 participating countries.

EVERY BRILLIANT THING Play Schedule(s)

No upcoming shows.

Please click here for the preview of the play

read / post your comments

Discussion Board