The Crucible by Arthur Miller
Performed at the Royal Exchange
Theatre, Manchester and directed by Caroline Steinbeis
The Royal
Exchange Theatre in Manchester is my favourite Manchester building as it sums
up for me, the city of Manchester. Housed inside a 19th century building in the Great Hall where cotton was traded, it is a theatre in the round; set in a sputnik like structure, a visitor from the
future. The board from the last day of trading
looks down. It is a perfect fusion of 21st century creativity and
past glories.
The Crucible lived up to expectation and seemed
oddly fitting in the cauldron of the theatre structure. Set in Salem, New
England, it drew on the story of the Salem witches of the late seventeenth
century. The play was first performed in 1953 amidst the McCarthy enquiries and
the parallels between the situations must have resonated with those first
audiences, and in the modern day, it asked questions about society today.
As an
examination of how an organisation or community exerts control through excluding
disagreement or dissent, the performance succeeded. The set, a simple shining
circle emphasised the boundaries around the society through its simplicity and starkness.
It was only at the end when the entire area flooded as the witch hunt was
becoming untenable that I felt that it was beginning to distract from the
story. It interrupted my concentration and I found myself watching the actors
wading about, aware that they were actors playing a part. However, the water
itself seemed to show both the fabric of society unravelling and at the same
time, echoed thoughts of cleansing and washing away of the past.
Fear and
suspicion spread through the village as the investigation into the accusations
of witchcraft took hold. As a member of the audience, I felt this tension and
distrust to the end.
In short: I found it a compelling play to
watch.
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