★★★★★
For some it might seem as if everything has been said that needs to be said about dictatorship: its methods, its consequences, its real-life significance. But in Project Dictator, clowning double-act Rhum and Clay have found a way to delve deep into its horror through theatrical metaphor: dismantling our complacencies about theatre, comedy and society in a breath-taking seventy five minutes.
At first, Matt Wells and Jeremy Spooner enter the stage as author and star of the play Martin and put-upon ‘Everything Else’ Jeremy, ready to perform Martin’s ‘How to Solve the Problem(s)’. Almost immediately, and hilariously, the conventions of writer-director-actor status are undermined, including some brilliant physical comedy and audience interaction. We are lulled into a false sense of security by the gentle satire, nudging of straight man, musician Khaled Kurbeh, and knockabout physicality.
However, the comedy quickly sours with the relationship between the two men, as their power struggle extends into physical violence and Jeremy’s mania to produce something more ‘FUN’ than Martin’s original vision. The previous theatrical tropes are brilliantly employed here to emphasise our complicity in this. Jeremy encourages the audience’s loyalty, and we become so swept along that it is only on reflection that we realise this is how populism works, distilled down to some comedic cavorting with balloons.
The second half provides a dark mirror to the first, as Jeremy and Martin are controlled as clowns by an unseen voice, mirroring the experiences of populations under dictatorships. Near wordless and with both actors conveying an extraordinary talent for physicality, the clown becomes a metaphor for control, betrayal, and desperation, as rehearsed actions become warped and controlled by the interaction between the personal and the despotic. We are encouraged to interrogate the despotism of both dictators and the theatre, as well as our own expectations. The play consistently working on a micro and macro level. Both the audience and Kurbeh become complicit in this, applauding when told to, and separated from the actors by the ingenious use of a see-through curtain to make the fourth wall an Iron Curtain. The ending is poignant and shocking, open-ended and thrilling.
The piece was created in collaboration with thirteen international artists who remain anonymous, and co-directing team Spooner, Wells and Hamish MacDougall do their experiences justice. There is a sense of urgency produced by these contributions, and a reiteration of the power of theatre to represent these experiences in ways that cut to the quick through pure performance. It is unsettling and fantastic, both in how it uses its artists and how it acts as a lacerating indictment of what we accept, how we are coerced, and how the role of the creative fits into this.
There is nothing quite like Project Dictator: from its blistering look at dictatorial regimes, to the overwhelming talent of its performers, to its ingenious use of theatrical convention. It is not afraid to unsettle it’s audience in the most original ways. It is brief, it is beautiful, it is unmissable.
Words by Issy Flower
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