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Show: Victoria Station
Society: Parodos Theatre Company
Venue: Gaiety theatre, Douglas, Isle of Man
Credits: Harold Pinter
Type: Sardines
Author: Paul Johnson
Performance Date: 30/03/2024
Victoria Station
Paul Johnson | 01 Apr 2024 16:46pm
Photo: Paul Johnson
Written by Harod Pinter, the Isle of Man’s absurdist night continues with Victoria Station. The two-hander which features a taxi-controller speaking over the air with one of his cabbies… or is he? The difference with Pinter and Churchill is that Pinter knows how to be very funny. He employs this skill throughout.
That is until somebody suggested to me the guy being spoken to is actually a passenger who has murdered a female taxi-driver. The difference is one man is exicitable and trying to talks to the driver. The other man decides to go for it.
The man deploys Pinter pauses as much as he can. And there are many. The controller is looking for a driver to pick up a fare from london. When he radios the driver all he got back isn’t excruciatingly long pause before saying the word “Yes”
There’s one single point when the driver SHOUTS OUT, “Don’t talk to 145, they won’t give you what you want!”
The sense of menace runs throughout and it’s palpable. Yet the audience were still laughing too. Mind you some of our greatest laughs come out of a serious moment.
At no point did the audience gat the impression that the Controller might have sussed out what was going on which doesn’t really go with the script, like when he said to the driver, “I’d like to come over there right now and shake your hand.” It’s a simple distraction technique.” Why would he say it other wise? In another distraction technique, he also said to the driver the two of them should go on holiday together. Why nothing happened, acting-wise, made the event all the more absurd.
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All photos: Paul Johnson