Review: Carbon at Red Stitch Theatre
Review by Liz Baldwin
We use the word ‘alien’ all the time. I feel alienated from a group. Her feeling is alien to me. He alienated my affection; a person’s immigration status renders them a legal ‘alien’. As is so often the case, our endless capacity for reinvention (and hyperbole) has divorced the word from its meaning. Our common humanity undergirds every interaction. We share something molecular - or at least that’s the theory of Carbon, a play by Pier Lorenzo Pisano.
Carbon forces the audience to confront the reality of a true alien - something totally other. A man has encountered a non-carbon-based life form that seems beyond communication - and may threaten the stability of life on Earth. The play was first performed in 2021 and won Italy's 56th Premio Riccione per il Teatro in 2022. This production by director Katy Maudlin at Red Stitch Theatre is the Australian debut of this compelling, unsettling play.
The action unfolds over the course of an interview between ‘B’ (Pantazi Terzian), who encountered the alien, and ‘A’ (Caroline Lee), who questions him about that experience. Both performances are striking. Lee’s portrayal of the interviewer is empathetic, perceptive, and unrelenting - a woman clinging to professionalism even as Earth’s pillars may be shaking. Terzian ably moves between a kind of numb defeat at being asked the same series of questions, and occasional fits of frustration when A hits a nerve. It’s a compelling portrait of a man having a completely alien experience - something no one can claim to truly understand.
The interview is interspersed with interludes from ‘Voice’ (Conor Leach), who takes the role of jolly, nihilistic MC. Voice lectures us about the history of humanity’s attempts to communicate with the universe - notably, the Voyager Golden Records - and the futility of attempts to imbue the randomness of our existence with meaning. Leach’s unblinking, high-sheen visage is perfect for the role. Yet I found that the interludes tended to undermine the tension created by the interview, and added a more didactic tone to the otherwise deliberately ambiguous play.
In the second half of the 90-minute, no-interval run, the play takes a sharp turn away from its cerebral opening. We’re reminded that this is true science fiction, not just a convenient guise through which to explore trauma and existential questions. While it ups the pace, I felt this turn distracted from the emotional depths plumbed in the first half. Thinking through how you’d react to such a singular encounter is a universal experience; the ‘where’ and ‘how’ of an alien presence are not.
Anna Cordingley’s set and costume design evokes a cosy 20th century TV set - muted autumnal tones and an architectural coffee table. It’s the perfect foil to the existential drama unfolding atop it, speaking to the endless creativity in our attempts to put cushioning between ourselves and the hard facts of our existence.
Maudlin and Red Stitch Theatre have delivered a worthy adaptation of a thoroughly original, thought-provoking play.
