Two Plays

BURGERZ // Review

How do you picture your burger? Sandwiched between two buns? Perhaps it will be served in a neat cardboard box for leisurely consumption elsewhere. Or maybe it will not be consumed at all, but thrown. Th is is what Travis Alabanza experienced on Waterloo bridge in broad daylight in April, 2016. A burger aimed and landed. A trans slur hurled and heard. Nothing was done and a mark was made.

Th e burger is ubiquitous, much loved and universal. It is also the site of violence as trans artist Alabanza and director Sam Curtis Lindsay explore in a seventy minute piece of theatre designed to implicate each and every audience member. Th at we as individuals must ‘step up’ is the unavoidable message at an unwritten and contingent conclusion. Th e burger serves as a deliciously emotive storytelling device. Made right in front of our eyes, we watch its journey from little parts to a recognisable ‘whole’. Part comic cookery show, part memoir but always making sure that we, the audience, do not fl oat away into Hot Dog dream land: this is important and we must listen. “Why is trans never seen as a destination, but as a synonym for a broken body?”Alabanza wonders out loud. Th ey are a they and he/she does not always cut it, does not cover every type of body, impulse or existence. Th e stage is their safe space. Th ey are in charge and jokes, sharp in intent but good natured in delivery are doled out in generous portions. A black body, dressed in a blue smock, turquoise heels and polka dot socks is here to bring prejudice to bear. Both their own stories and, crucially, others are deconstructed in front of our very eyes. Alabanza needs help, from a certain type of person, we “have some shit we gotta work through” but so do we all.

Much like its namesake, Burgerz maintains a stylish, slick but always surprising aesthetic and choreography. Th e domesticated ‘kitsch’ scene by set and costume designer Soutra Gilmour is brought to beautiful irony in a show that refuses to be put in a box and wrapped up with a satisfying and neat bow. As the age old saying goes, art imitates life and as such, a side salad of discomfort is highly necessary. Th ere is no such thing as an innocent burger. Th e next time we tune out on a bus in order to tune in to a playlist ‘made earlier’, we may remember “melody is a privilege for those that do not need to be aware”. Despite being labeled recently as ‘the most vegan friendly city in the world’ Dublin needs this show and it’s burgerz just as much as anywhere.

Collection of Lovers // Review

“Four of them are in this room” is a potent statement from Portugese performance artist and collector Raquel Andre which causes us all to stir in our seats and swivel heads. Recently, Andre has been collecting lovers, 245 to date and we have just learnt that four of them are also sitting in the snug space within the Project Arts Centre. Th is is not the only shocking statistic in a show which primarily functions on Andres strangely meditative voice taking us through numbers and experiences of intimacy within her encounters. “In ninety percent of these meetings, loneliness is a topic” Andre tells us deliberately yet without sentimentality. A project exploring intimacy, staged and presented in the presence of a small audience seems like an unlikely moment to look at the juxtaposing experience of aloneness. Yet, anyone who has ever become familiar with online dating apps will also know that the two can coexist incredibly eff ectively. A feature of our current media obsessed age? Perhaps.

A common theme within a steady stream of Andre’s diverse encounters was her question, what does intimacy mean to you? We hear that ‘lover 117’ classifi es it as “what stays between these four walls.” As well as a general aphorism for human connection, this lover has unknowingly created a perfect analogy to the importance of theatre in an increasingly mediatized age: four walls and a moment in time which can never be repeated—as Walter Benjamin states,‘reproduced’. Despite their reduction to numbers, which seems ironic in a piece exploring unique moments and by extension authenticity, these lovers are not mere statistics or data for Andre’s project. She lovingly shows us gift s given or letters written to her by the men and women that she came into contact with through her explorations. Like an archaeologist loves his artefacts, Rachel Andre loves and is fascinated by the ‘unique moments’ that make up a life. She reminds us that our gathering here in this theatre listening and observing together is one of these unique moments. Indeed, perhaps we will make up a part of her next collection—“of spectators”. One point which is not brought up during the sixty minute show is how Andre met these lovers. I like to think that swiping right through a certain dating app was not involved in the process but instead a more ‘human’ approach in a show which does well to remind us all of our corporeality, providing hope that “connecting with the other is still possible”.