The sea reveals and conceals its secrets and mysteries, just as life itself does to us humans. For a moment we think we see life. Then it is gone. And then we forget. And then we forget forever. Sea is one of Jon Fosse’s later plays; more abstract than his earlier work, in that it is stripped of social totems and his figures face the dark unaided and isolated. Even when the sea drift pulls them together their memories are fractured and the life shared recedes with the tide. What survives of the moment once glimpsed? Love, warmth, tenderness. But the certainty has gone with the strength to ride the waves. Jon Fosse describes the theatre as the “art of the human.” Sea is terrifying, but seeing human beings free of distraction in their reality is a relief and, almost, a comfort.
'A truly amazing piece of work. So original and such a brilliant way of looking at people and what they do to each other... A fierce recommendation.' (Dame Emma Thompson).
Laurie Slade’s extraordinary innovative, challenging, heartfelt, enriching and guileful new two-hander is a celebration of the unique and life-affirming value of live theatre. At its heart it explores how two people, two creative consciousnesses, can truly, really, rawly connect: as therapist and client, as performers, as lovers….as dreamers? What might stand in the way of such a connection, and what are the power-plays and ethics involved? Two people meet ostensibly as therapist and client, to find a common and enriched reality that will release the client into a fuller and more fulfilling inner life. But what is really going on? And whose reality is it anyway? How do we decide what moon we reach for?
Informed equally by the playwright’s long experience in theatre and as a practising psychotherapist with a particular interest in ‘social dreaming’, Supermoon is a switchback ride for actors and audience alike; a 90-minute dream fantasia that, while seeming to channel aspects of, for example, (Anthony) Schaffer’s Sleuth, (Peter) Schaffers Equus, Nick Payne’s Constellations and David Mamet’s Oleanna, at the same time offers its own entirely original high-impact theatrical shaping of the quest for an ultimate, shared reality.
Presence is aiming to share Supermoon with audiences in a full production in London in 2021.