THEATRE REVIEW: TALK
6 Mar'10

'Talk' something to mull over

JOHN COULBOURN -QMI Agency
Rating: 3.5 out of 5

More and more, those without a personal stake in the Arab/Israeli conflict seem to be so overwhelmed by the effort involved in sorting out the rights and the wrongs of the situation, that they choose not to think about it all, except with resignation and despair.

Which means they never talk about it, of course.

That might make the Harold Green Jewish Theatre Company’s production of Michael Nathanson’s Governor General Award-nominated TALK a bit of a tough sell in some quarters.

Which is too bad really, for while the play at first seems to be almost exclusively about what we have come to euphemistically dismiss as the situation in the Middle East — and indeed offers more than a bit of history on the subject — TALK is finally about the end of a friendship, and what happens when caring people become so entrenched in expounding what they think and feel that they shut themselves off from the thoughts and feelings of others.

That would be people such as Joshua (played by Michael Rubenfeld) and Gordon (Kevin Bundy), old friends since their university days and reunited for one night in the middle of a frigid Manitoba winter.

The purpose of their reunion is to allow Gordon to introduce Josh to Clotilde, the French enchantress he has met and fallen in love with while working in London — “the good one, not the one in Ontario,” his friend explains.

TALK, which opened Thursday in the Jane Mallett Theatre, follows hard on the heels of that meeting, Clotilde having retired to her hotel to afford the two old friends some guy-time to catch up. Gordon asks Josh what he thinks of Clotilde, and Josh hesitates before answering, finally revealing that, as a Jew, he’s offended by a single word Clotilde dropped into in their conversation — the word Palestine, in fact.

And that word proves to be a bomb that threatens to blow-up their friendship — either now, or in a shared future, if it cannot be defused.

As the argument rages, the two struggle to come to terms with who they are, what they believe and who they have become, their spoken arguments rocketing along a parallel track to their ongoing interior monologues. In such debates thoughts are thoughts, it seems, and feelings are feelings — and never the twain shall meet. The two old friends become progressively more entrenched in their opposing positions, each growing less and less concerned with the feelings of the other as they try to bully the other into a new way of thinking.

And therein one finds the universality of the tale, for while the subject here is the never-ending conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, it could as easily be a debate about abortion, same-sex marriage or the death penalty, for that matter.

Director Ted Dykstra does an impressive job of balancing his two fine performers on both an emotional and a political tightrope throughout, making the most of Steve Lucas’ elegant and simple set and lighting, and almost succeeding in disguising the fact that, as theatre goes, this is a whole lot of talk and very little action.

Unfortunately, the producers don’t help, for while one applauds the line-up of post-show speakers, ranging from the playwright through to religious leaders and even Martin Luther King III (on March 20), those speakers are, if the opening-night format is followed, an obligatory addendum to the production, rather than an optional bonus. After 85 minutes, there are some people who might just want to reflect on the play — or even just take a pee. They deserve a break — and a choice.