“will need a more powerfully unique identity to make a lasting impression”
Essie has lost her job, her girlfriend, most of her savings, and she’s just one more interview away from losing her mind. Written by Margaret Perry, performed by Breffni Holahan, and directed by Thomas Martin, Collapsible is a one-woman show about a world overflowing with information, but short on meaning.
If you missed Collapsible at VAULT Festival earlier this year, you have a second chance to catch it at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. One of several HighTide productions in Edinburgh this summer, Collapsible has instances of very good writing, but it’s missing the innovation it needs to stand out above the crowd of shows about middle-class problems.
Alison Neighbour’s set is striking. Echoing a demolition site, there’s rubble on the ground, and broken metal beams framing the space in a triangle. Holahan sits high up on a short, jagged slab of concrete supported by a pole. She remains on this perch for the duration of the show. Her precarious position, surrounded by the remains of a collapsed building, provide effective, creative visual reinforcement of the play’s themes. Holahan, confined to a block just a couple feet square, gives an impressive performance. She holds nothing back in communicating the depth of Essie’s sadness.
The play explores Essie’s narcissism, depression, and experience of depersonalisation as she goes back through her list of contacts (including old teachers and ex-partners) to try to better understand herself. Because narcissism dominates the story, it quickly overwhelms it. The constant rumination on who Essie is precisely – what kind of person she is – makes the scenes more insular than relatable. It results in the show feeling very long for its sixty-minute runtime. The writing is stronger when it moves away from Essie’s quest to define herself. The descriptions of depression (being filled with stones) and depersonalisation are more compelling.
Regrettably, especially in Essie’s relationships with her family, the story is very much in the shadow of Fleabag. Perry may well be giving an authentic account of her own experience, but because something so similar has already been done on such a large scale, the edge is lost. The scenes between Essie and her sister, her friend, and her dad feel derivative. There’s a nagging sense throughout that we’ve seen and heard it all before.
Middle-class emptiness is well-trodden territory; it’s too easy for shows like this one to get lost in the shuffle. Collapsible will need a more powerfully unique identity to make a lasting impression. As it is, Neighbour’s set is the most singular part of the production.
Reviewed by Addison Waite
Collapsible
Assembly Roxy until 25th August as part of Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2019
“The Dot Collective and director Laura Harling have created something truly beautiful”
Walking into the venue I was spoken to by someone who I thought was a helpful road worker, he said “are you here for that One Hundred Trillion thing? It’s over there”. I proceeded to walk into the venue thinking nothing more of this. On receiving my ticket I was directed to walk up some stairs where I was greeted in an exaggerated manner by a gentleman who showed me the way to the bar or to the toilets … I chose the bar. I didn’t think much about my earlier encounters as I listened to the live music being performed in there by two of the cast.
I think it’s important to say that this isn’t a ‘show’ or even a ‘performance’, I feel it surpasses those terms and sits better being referred to as an experience, and what an experience it is. We are exposed to facts and figures regarding dementia which we struggle to comprehend only to be then given a visual way of thinking about it, with the idea of the bookshelf. This helps us picture how the mind works in this way and the reasons some memories are kept and some drift away.
The experience then takes us on a literal journey around the building putting us in rooms covered in writings from actual people that the company has connected with through its research. These stories and real answers to questions littering the walls allow us into the very different minds that created them, they feel true and grounded. This is something I came back to a lot during the evening, the idea of truth and authenticity. The portrayal of those incredibly touching yet personal stories was sensitively done, letting us into the lives of those affected.
Interlacing the performance elements are snippets of footage from the various nursing homes the company had visited, reminding us that these are real people and what they say matters. These clips were sometimes supported with voiceovers from the creatives on the project explaining what they had done and who they had connected with in order to get their material, this cemented for me that this was a labour of love and not a vanity project. The creative team and seven strong cast gave an impression of really caring, and for an audience this means a lot, we feel comfortable laughing at funny lines and more importantly we feel okay to shed a tear when it touches us.
One Hundred Trillion is a promenade piece and each journey into a new room is a different performance – The Frames, written by Chantelle Dusette, I Could Have Danced All Night by Margaret Perry, Lucy Grace’s Topsoil, and London Bus by Lily Bevan.
The Dot Collective and director Laura Harling have created something truly beautiful, making memories feel real and showing us how important it is to celebrate what we remember because one day there’s a chance you might forget. A true work of brilliance, sensitively crafted and authentically shown, touching the audience on a human level.
