TRIBES AND TRIBULATIONS -
SUBSTANCE AND SHADOW THEATRE
SUBSTANCE AND SHADOW THEATRE
Substance And Shadow Theatre are testament to what can be achieved if
you have the will. Based in Exeter, they're a non-profit making
minimalist theatre group and their latest production, Tribes And
Tribulations was recently staged for two nights at the world
famous Blackmore Theatre in Exmouth, as part of the Exmouth Festival.
Featuring just four players; with the help of light, sound and a
change of hats they manage to successfully recreate on a small, bare
stage a free festival of 4,000 people. Which is no mean feat. Just
try it yourself and see how you get on. The four main characters each
have a separate tale to tell and against the background chaos of the
festival they unfold.
There's Sammy and his younger sister Georgie who having been deserted
by their parents are facing eviction from their home due to unpaid
rent. According to Georgie, Sammy is a prick who idolises Bruce Lee
and spends all his time dreaming and smoking spliffs in the woods.
Georgie is basically a teenage upstart but at the same time an
innocent abroad who needs protecting though her elder brother is
failing in this. Then there's Crumb, an unemployed, Scottish docker
who having seen his community smashed by Thatcherism has taken to the
road as a traveller where he is now a member of the Peace Convoy,
travelling from festival to festival. And finally there's Cara,
girlfriend of the leader of a chapter of Hell's Angels whose faith in
Mary, mother of Jesus has been shattered following the disappearance
of her younger sister years before, leaving Cara adrift in what she
perceives to be a cruel world, not knowing whether her sister is
still alive somewhere or dead. Cara, it also turns out, is pregnant.
Having stolen a stash of LSD that's been buried by the Hell's Angels
in the woods he hangs out in, Sammy sees it as the answer to his and
Georgie's money problems so heads off to a free festival to do some
selling. Unbeknownst to him, however, he's being trailed by Georgie
and when he's offered a lift by Crumb in his converted ambulance she
jumps in also and for her it's the start of a very strange trip
indeed. Particularly after innocently taking some of Sammy's new
found LSD.
Tribes And Tribulations doesn't centre around any one theme at all
but instead weaves the stories (both inner and outer) of the main
characters into one tapestry. In fact if anything, the dominating
theme of the play is the festival itself and the culture of free
festival life. It should be pointed out that the play is set in 1984,
a time when festivals were nothing like the corporate affairs that
they are these days. This also means that it's set just a year before
the demonisation of the Peace Convoy, the Battle of the Beanfield,
and the smashing of the Stonehenge free festival in some of the most
sickening scenes of police hate and violence I've ever witnessed -
and after all these years something I'd still like to see avenged.
Being such a cultured and intelligent theatre-goer I was fully au
fait with all the references within the play such as when Crumb
refers to Culture Shock a few times as opposed to culture shock. Overly so sometimes however,
because as an example I happen to know Culture Shock weren't actually around in
1984. Also, the (fictional) name given to the festival they all
gather at is Golden Dawn which is fine except that I and my fellow cultured and intelligent theatre-going audience members immediately
associate Golden Dawn with the Far Right political Party of Greece.
So the name has (unintentional) connotations.
Not that any of these things matter as they do nothing to take away
any enjoyment of the play but as a cultured and intelligent theatre
critic I'm just doing my job in pointing them out, m'am...
And tieing in with things not mattering, the best part of the play
for me was when the sun comes up (the golden dawn) and Crumb
ruminates over the meaning of it all. There's the sun blazing away in
all it's glory and here we all are underneath it, running around
worrying about our mortgages and what our neighbours are thinking and
so on. Deadpan and straight to the audience, Crumb accentuates the
fact that these things don't actually matter. None of it matters.
I understand Substance And Shadow Theatre are touring Tribes And
Tribulations around the country over the coming months, playing at
various theatres. Go and see them, I would say. They're great,
basically, and destined for greater things. Their next production, in
fact, to be debuted in the autumn is going to be called Skin Deep and
will centre upon skinheads in the early 1980s, the Ska/Two-Tone music
of that period, and working class ethics. I'll see you all there down
at the Blackmore again, hopefully. Dressed appropriately.
John Serpico
