Simon Stephens' Pornography

It is a very difficult task to write about something that is culturally and emotionally not exactly relevant to me. There is a great deal of national feeling and a sense of national solidarity in the play as the actual events and consequences of winning the right to hold the 2012 Olympic Games and more importantly, those of the July 7 bombings unfold. Lucky for me, these are not the issues Stephens focuses on.

It is the people that we should listen to. And accordingly, the monologues are the most powerful parts of the whole play, especially those of the Terrorist and the Student. It is not by coincidence that they both represent the angry, aggressive youth culture which is dissatisfied with the current power and which tends towards violent self-expression and a simplified worldview. The Student is neurotic and slightly racist and the spectator might even make the causal connection between this and the final deeds of the Terrorist. He is angry too and desperate to show something to the world. What this “something” may be, even he himself does not know. The merits of these two actors are undeniable but we should not forget about the playwright either. By making the soliloquies painfully personal and often baffling, he leaves space for the audience to make up its own mind about these issues.

As a non-professional, I can say that the actors’ and actresses’ performances were quite satisfying on the whole, the Student and the Terrorist being the most remarkable. However, I was not entirely satisfied with the setting. I find the idea of the huge glass surfaces captivating and haunting at the same time, especially when the reflections doubled or even tripled the image of the characters as if they had split personalities. The music was disturbing and loud which served the (supposed) purpose of Stephens well. On the other hand, I would not be so sure about the success of the projections. They were often very annoying and most of the time seemed to be out of context and rather arbitrary.

All in all, I think it is a good play, the actors are obviously devoted and talented and they were able to make the characters seem real but something went wrong with the production. It might be that the audience comprised mostly of Hungarians, thus they could barely be culturally drawn to this play or it might be that the director had the same problem which he tried to overcome by using fancy, but unfortunately very distracting stage devices. They distract us so much that the whole point of the play is endangered and that is a serous mistake.