Becky Shaw: Fresh, sharp and on stage now
Ghent theatre company Het KIP serves up an oh-so contemporary fable about love and failure
All you need is love
Becky Shaw – a play as innovative and sharp as the 10 previous productions by Ghent theatre company Het KIP – is all about love, in its most contemporary sense: Arrogant, adopted brother has sex with desperate sister, sister gets married shortly after to dotty bearded do-gooder, do-gooder feels all too concerned with the fate of naive and empty-headed intern at work, intern at work is invited to a dinner party to be coupled with the adopted brother.
The plot – or soap opera, if you will – unfolds, showing just how fashionable it is for modern 30-year-olds to rave about their misfortunes in love, be devoured by passion or just simply be looking for money. Things often work out if we listen to mum – but in this case, she appears to not be such a moral authority either.
Becky Shaw was written by New York City-based playwright and TV writer Gina Gionfriddo. At the play’s premiere in early 2009, The New York Times asserted that it “lifted the gloom shrouding the theatre district a little … as engrossing as it is ferociously funny, like a big box of fireworks fizzing and crackling across the stage from its first moments to its last”.
So how did it end up in Ghent? “A few years ago I was visiting a friend who was studying at a theatre school in New York,” says Yahya Terryn, director of Becky Shaw. “We had decided to try to write a play together. One of the things I absolutely wanted to do was visit the New York Theater and Film Bookstore to find new, fresh plays by young writers. I asked the lady at the counter if she could recommend something sharp. She almost immediately pulled out a copy of Becky Shaw.”
Classic form
It was love at first sight. “I bought 13 plays in total,” Terryn says, “but I threw away most of them. Becky Shaw hit me like few plays ever have. For me, it fits in with legendary plays like Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? or Patrick Marber’s Closer.”
You can’t say who’s the good guy and who’s the bad guy
Becky Shaw starts in a way that couldn’t be any more classic: two people facing the audience in the midst of an argument, introducing the story line. But that is easily forgiven, as the rest of the play – even in Het KIP’s version – crackles and sizzles. “Its form is all too classic,” explains Terryn, “but the characters’ personalities unfold from scene to scene, slowly and intricately, just like the conflict the play is headed toward.”
Becky Shaw couldn’t be more contemporary. Who among us hasn’t encountered a girl with low self-esteem, left behind by lovers and attached to her own misery because she has nothing else on which to build her personality? That girl is Becky Shaw.
And who hasn’t come across successful and cynical businessmen who know how to handle money and women, but refuse to take responsibility in an almost compulsive way? That is the adoptive son, Max.
Everyone knows that when these two meet, there’s going to be trouble. “Still, each character consists of many layers,” says Terryn. “Over the course of the play, you get to know them quite well, and, at the end, it’s impossible to judge. You can’t say who’s the good guy and who’s the bad guy.”
A feast of failings
Becky Shaw is about, continues Terryn, “how people sometimes follow and agree with each other’s ideas, while other times, they just can’t. But there’s also the important element of communication within a family. The meaning of a family’s communication changes drastically from the moment others enter the picture. That is the beauty of it.”
Romantic relations are the pairing of equals
While the play is all-American in its build-up and plot, it is fully applicable to a Flemish urban setting. But Terryn has smartly introduced some truly American elements. Large screens stand behind the actors, projecting the name of the play or the names of the actors in quirky colourful fonts between scenes.
While members of the audience are scratching their heads about whether they are watching first-class theatre or an ordinary sitcom, Terryn teases them even more by shamelessly projecting one of the scenes on the screens, in which the acting, editing and decor barely reach Flemish sitcom standards.
“In the original play, the actors always sit or stand somewhere, and they have a conversation,” says Terryn. “That’s the American way of telling a story. It’s as if you were watching a movie or a sitcom. It’s nice to preserve this element if you want to stage an American play in Flanders. But there’s also a practical reason behind the sitcom form: In American plays, the audience has to wait several minutes between scenes for the set change. We solved that problem by using the screens to project the setting.”
Becky Shaw is a feast for those with a sincere love for people’s failings. “Romantic relations are the pairing of equals,” is said more than once – but only by those who have shown they are not able to love. “I promise: I will never leave you and always care for you. Because you need me,” says the intolerable writer with the messiah complex to a crying Becky Shaw. In the meantime, the complacent sister and adoptive brother discuss porn.
It’s truly a feast.
19 April: CC Guldenberg, Wevelgem
25 April: CC Brasschaat, Brasschaat
26 April: De Werf, Bruges
Photo by Thomas Dhanens
More performances this week
Tell Me Love is Real
Zachary Oberzan
After spending a few years with New York’s Nature Theatre of Oklahoma, Zachary Oberzan went solo. In the winter of 2011, he survived a Xanax overdose – about the same time Whitney Houston died of hers. Tell Me Love is Real is the tale of his quest for healing, during which he reawakens the spirits of Buddy Holly, Bruce Lee and Serge Gainsbourg (in English). 18 & 19 April, Beursschouwburg, Brussels
Wijven
Ontroerend Goed
Is there truly such a thing as female identity? In this performance, six young actresses do absolutely everything they can to oppose feminism, confirm stereotypes and be as anti-emancipatory as possible (in Dutch). 17-19 April, Vooruit, Ghent
De stoelen
Theater aan de Stroom
Marc Cnops, Bob Snijers and Magda Cnudde present their version of French-Romanian playwright Eugène Ionesco’s The Chairs. In a round tower on a deserted island, an old couple receive many guests who come to listen to the old man. He’s now reaching the end of his life and has a message for the whole world (in Dutch). 17-27 April, Theater aan de Stroom, Antwerp
Bite the Hand that Feeds You
Kloppend Hert
“Some have to have their hair cut every day, or it would choke them. Others can play the guitar wonderfully well, even with clawed fingers.” Four actors reverse the clichés about gipsies. Together with young Roma musicians, they make a fairytale that bites (in Dutch). 18-19 April, CC Berchem
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