EINKVAN
Coronet Theatre
★★★★★
“Fosse’s sparse poetic script strips life down to its essentials, matching the images on the screens”
Einkvan is a rare opportunity to see the work of Nobel prize winning playwright Jon Fosse in London. It’s also a chance to see it at the Coronet Theatre in Notting Hill in the original Norwegian (or Nynorsk) complete with the talented cast and crew from Det Norske Teatret, who gave the world premiere of this play in Oslo in 2024. For the Coronet production, voiceovers are given in Nynorsk, with English subtexts appearing simultaneously on screen. And you’ll find plenty to focus on in a play that is both oddly isolating for the viewer, and intensely personal. “Einkvan” means Everyman in Norwegian, so there’s no escape from self reflection, as we follow the story of two aging parents trying desperately to maintain contact with a son who doesn’t want anything to do with them.
Throughout Einkvan, the focus is on the actors’ faces on the screens. These faces are unnaturally enlarged. We see every haunted gaze, every wrinkle, every tear. Director Kjersti Horn concentrates on these unnatural closeups, first of one actor, divided into two screens, then two actors, and most unnervingly, when one actor melts from his screen into the other, joining his companion. Water plays an important part in the images and in the words as well, whether it is the water that submerges the actors at times, to the father’s wistful memories of fishing with his boy. Fosse’s sparse poetic script strips life down to its essentials, matching the images on the screens. It’s an illuminating, as well as uncomfortable journey for all present in the theatre—an exploration to discover what really matters when life seems to offer nothing but loneliness. For the parents, it’s a distressing experience of never quite meeting their adult child, or connecting with him any more. For the child, it’s all about escaping those oppressive family ties, but escaping to what? Ultimately, Fosse seems to suggest that human bonds are not as important as one’s art, whether it’s drama or painting. Art is real, in a way that people can’t be. But depending on one’s age, or family circumstances, or even one’s art, each audience member’s journey throughout Einkvan is going to be a bit different. And, as mentioned before, all these close ups, in language, and image, are intensely personal.
The Coronet’s stage has been raised up to the level of the balcony for this production, and the space is dominated by an immense cube. Divided into two halves, the lower half of the cube is closed in by opaque curtains, lit from within and without. (Lighting design by Oscar Udbye). Throughout the performance, we see the dim outline of an actor moving back and forth. Above the curtains, are two large screens. The audience sit directly in front, and close to this oppressive, yet brilliantly conceived, set. (Set and costume design by Sven Haraldsson). The playing time is about right for a piece that drifts, rather than moves through the action. Given the intensity of the whole experience, Fosse and Horn have an acute sense of just how much the audience can bear.
After the show is over, and the actors appear on stage to great applause, there is one more surprise. If the audience was lulled into thinking that Einkvan was an evening in the cinema rather than the theatre, the appearance of the two younger actors completely soaked from their immersion in the on screen bathtub, eliminates that illusion. What we observed on the screens was a real time videotaping (directed by Mads Sjøgård Pettersen) of the action going on behind the opaque curtains. It’s a lovely reminder that live theatre is always taking place in the present. In film, what seems to be taking place in the present, has actually taken place in the past. It’s a fitting metaphor for Einkvan, where the actors and the audience explore the limits of memories, only to find that the present cannot save us from the fear of being alone in the world. And that this sense of loneliness only intensifies as one moves through life.
If you are up for such an experience, I heartily recommend Det Norske Teatret’s production of Jon Fosse’s Einkvan. Bring a friend. You will have much to discuss after the show in the Coronet Theatre’s lovely bar, and much to think about as you make your way home. It’s a show that will continue to haunt you, in your own company, or with others.
EINKVAN
Coronet Theatre
Reviewed on 8th May 2025
by Dominica Plummer
Photography by Tristram Kenton
Previously reviewed at this venue:
PANDORA | ★★★★ | February 2025
STRANGER THAN THE MOON | ★★★ | December 2024
U-BU-SU-NA | ★★★★★ | November 2024
THE BELT | ★★★★★ | September 2024
THE BECKETT TRILOGY | ★★★★★ | June 2024
THE YELLOW WALLPAPER | ★★★ | September 2023
RHYTHM OF HUMAN | ★★★★★ | September 2023
LOVEFOOL | ★★★★ | May 2023
DANCE OF DEATH | ★★★★★ | March 2023
WHEN WE DEAD AWAKEN | ★★★★ | March 2022
