Death and The Maiden | Ad Astra
Death and the Maiden delves into the long-term effects of trauma and paranoia following a fascist and totalitarian rule. Set 15 years after the instalment of a democratic government, a household turns to chaos when Paulina (played by Sandra Harman) comes to the terrifying realisation that she recognises the voice of a man who is speaking to her husband. Believing that the man, Dr Miranda, is among a group of men who, under the fascist regime, had kidnapped and tortured her, she decides to take justice into her own hands. As an audience, we are left wondering right to the end of the play whether the man she has bound in her home is guilty of the crimes Paulina condemns him for or whether her trauma has shaped an elaborate narrative that allows her to punish the guilty and move on from her past.
Tom Coyle, who played Dr Roberto Miranda, was enthralling to watch and completely stole the show. Although his role was arguably the smallest of the play, he managed to shape it into a deeply layered and emotive character. It was impossible for me to tell whether the character was motivated by fear or guilt, and I think that is what made Coyle’s character so interesting to watch. While other action was occurring away from Coyle, I still found my eyes glued to him to try and get even a brief glimpse of a hidden layer I might have been missing.
It took me a while to grasp what was happening in the plot, which I think was largely due to the geography of the play. Death and the Maiden was originally written in Spanish by Chilean playwright Ariel Dorfman. Dorfman wrote the play following the restoration of democracy in Chile. Although the script doesn’t explicitly state the country in which it is set it is safe to assume that it was Chile.
It seemed clear to me that this version was set in the USA. This decision made it somewhat challenging to follow the plot at times because words and locations were obscured by the use of accents, and it appears that certain parts of the script deviate from the original in Spanish, while in other sections they remained the same. It’s not clear which English version of the script they worked from. Having read the original version in Spanish, I do, however, believe that setting the play in a country that hasn’t been ruled under a dictatorship is an interesting choice. I would love to see how setting this play in Australia would have influenced the narrative by making the script closer to home for Australian audiences.
I really enjoyed the simplistic direction of this play. It complimented both the actors’ abilities and the beauty of using a small performance space. However, I do feel that there could have been some cleaner scene transitions. There were times when I felt that the actors had been off the stage for an uncomfortable amount of time. I did find this distracting and my mind drifted from the action of the play during these moments. Once the actors had returned, however, they won my attention again.
This piece worked well in the intimate environment of Ad Astra’s theatre. The set design was modest but incredibly detailed at the same time. It truly felt as though I was sitting in the characters’ living room, watching the action that took place at their kitchen table. I couldn’t help but think that it would have worked amazingly in a site-specific capacity, such as a small apartment or beach house at Sandgate | Warra.
Death and the Maiden gives fascinating insight into a life of paranoia that most of us, hopefully, will never experience. It also provides food for thought on the idea of presumption of innocence versus guilty until proven innocent.
