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The Coast of Utopia: Shipwreck
Apr. 24th, 2013 10:31 pmWe saw _Shipwreck_ tonight at the Shotgun Theatre on Ashby. It's the second play in Stoppard's revolutionary Russia trilogy -- and thus it's a bit of a tricky thing, as the middles of trilogy often are. Whereas the first play dealt with philosophers learning their craft, the second saw them become revolutionaries ... who saw revolutions (in France and Germany) fail. It was a clear setup for the third play, where one presumes they'll take their lessons learned in Europe (don't trust the bourgeois) and use them to ignite a true peoples' revolution in Russia.
Like the previous play, this one was clearly divided in two, and that was probably more troublesome than the fact that the play couldn't have any true conclusion. The first act was mostly about philosophy and the second act was mostly about relationships (the philosophy having failed). As a result the first act was talk, talk, talk, talk, talk. It reminded me of Stoppard's _Invention of Love_, which I similarly thought failed due to too much emphasis on talking about ideas.
Here, the second act redeemed the first, because you could better see that philosophy in the scope of the whole play and in the scope of these peoples' lives: jow it'd kept them from their relationships and their realities (in act I) and how those came bursting back when the philosophy failed. However, it was a trudge getting there.
I also missed the look at a real family that we saw in _Voyage_, full of people with well-described characters. I got a similar feeling of camaraderie from these young (male) philosophers in _Shipwreck_, but I didn't get as much a feel for who *they* were, because they so often hid behind their ideas.
It was overall an enjoyable play, at least after the second act, but not as good as the first. Nonetheless, I'm looking forward to the third part, and am sad I have to wait a year. K. and I will surely have to brush up on all the characters when we get there!
Like the previous play, this one was clearly divided in two, and that was probably more troublesome than the fact that the play couldn't have any true conclusion. The first act was mostly about philosophy and the second act was mostly about relationships (the philosophy having failed). As a result the first act was talk, talk, talk, talk, talk. It reminded me of Stoppard's _Invention of Love_, which I similarly thought failed due to too much emphasis on talking about ideas.
Here, the second act redeemed the first, because you could better see that philosophy in the scope of the whole play and in the scope of these peoples' lives: jow it'd kept them from their relationships and their realities (in act I) and how those came bursting back when the philosophy failed. However, it was a trudge getting there.
I also missed the look at a real family that we saw in _Voyage_, full of people with well-described characters. I got a similar feeling of camaraderie from these young (male) philosophers in _Shipwreck_, but I didn't get as much a feel for who *they* were, because they so often hid behind their ideas.
It was overall an enjoyable play, at least after the second act, but not as good as the first. Nonetheless, I'm looking forward to the third part, and am sad I have to wait a year. K. and I will surely have to brush up on all the characters when we get there!