Latest from Noises Off
Dear Flora,
Thank you for gifting us with such a beautiful play. It is not only beautifully written, but it has also been beautifully read over Zoom. I didn’t think I could enjoy a Zoom reading as much as I did. In fact, let me confess something to you: I logged in to Zoom expecting to listen to the reading of a play, and what I found there instead was so much more than a simple reading.
The performances were strong, the characters well-rounded, your words sweetly intimate and descriptive, and the story natural and relatable. I have not seen teenagers’ stories represented in theatre as much as I have on TV, for example, so this story and these characters made me think of Euphoria and Skins, and I’m glad you added an ‘adult insight’ through the later testimonies. I think it made the play more mature and turned it into a tender way of looking to the past, just to have a look to see what wasn’t right and how everyone managed to get over adolescence.
I loved the team you make together. I love the issues each character revealed —it reminded of my friends and me when we were that age— and the characters’ interactions. I could really feel the sense of a group; of them being similar and different at the same time, of them being together although maybe not understanding each other completely. Because that’s how it normally was when I was a teenager.
I think the play worked so well over Zoom because of the words you chose, and because of the themes that are brought up in casual conversations between the characters: the universe and its bigness, relativity and nothing really mattering at all, daffodils and other flowers blossoming in Bea’s garden as time passes, Mrs Dalloway, Virginia Woolf and being in love with another woman... make to hunt violets a rich and sensorial play with highly poetic nuances. I could imagine the flowers, the town and the experiences the characters described in full detail, as if I would be taken there by your words and my imagination.
I must also say, I can’t imagine this play being performed on stage right now, because I would miss listening to the stage directions and following the images brought up by simple conversation! (I consider this to be more a compliment than a critique.) I can’t wait to read this play myself and to watch its future productions —with stage directions or not, I’m sure you’ll make the right choice, and I’ll watch it.
All the best,
Esti
@noffmag / [javascript protected email address]
