Skip to main content
National Student Drama Festival Logo National Student Drama Festival
Donate
What's On
What We Do
What We Do
What is NSDF all about?
Our Yearly Festival NSDF CREATES The Bigger Room Project
Taking Part in the Festival
Taking Part in the Festival
How do I take part in NSDF?
How to Enter a Show Joining the Festival Team Write for Noises Off
Support Us
Support Us
How can you support NSDF's work?
Our Supporters Make a Donation Leave a Legacy Alumni Supporters Scheme
Our Story
Our Story
Find out more about the 65 year old Festival.
Our Mission Our History Our Principles Our People Our Alumni
The Fourth Wall
The Fourth Wall
Read articles from Noises Off, our Festival Magazine, and catch the latest from Team NSDF at Blogs & News
Blogs & News Noises Off
Noises Off Article

Standing alone

Published on
22nd April 2019

Standing Too Close...is too many things at once, says Marina Johnson

Share this article

I am standing in a crowd of people feeling utterly alone and tired.

My legs are made of rock, and the soles of my feet burn with fire. That's a metaphor.

If you are going to ask people to stand for an hour, you have to give them something to stand for.

I want to commend the show for pushing the boundaries of what counts as spoken word, songwriting, drama and gig theatre, but I don’t think they were successful at challenging the form. If anything, for me the show highlighted the flaws inherent in the system; those of self-indulgence, bias and ableism. Making the audience stand changes the way the invest in the show. They are not hiding in the anonymity of an auditorium, we are standing too close in the dark. We are much more active participants in the spectacle of spectating.

So, what were we offered in exchange? We were offered our white-boy-philosopher protagonist chasing his inhuman manic-pixie-dream-girl, who “did this to him”. The soothing and awkwardly charismatic performance of Jack Chamberlain makes it weirdly palatable to swallow the plot, as much as there is.

At points we get a glimpse behind the flawless-hero facade, and an insight into anxiety or using alcohol as a coping mechanism, but that interesting moment is snached away. Just when a call to revise the shitty visa system would be appropriate, we get another well trodden metaphor about how space makes you feel insignificant.

There is an rawness and honesty about the trials of the – do we like each other, or like-like each other – baby steps into relationships, and it works well as a sweet sad show for young-romantics.

I’m not sure I would even call this show gig theatre. In my mind it fits much more easily into poetry with a guitar soundtrack, the music seemed to me more of an afterthought accompaniment, rather than a key part of the show. The poetry seems to interrupt the songs and the songs feel like they would work better as an album or EP.

@noffmag / noff@nsdf.org.uk

Latest from Noises Off

Latest from Noises Off

See all
NSDF 2020

A timely pause

14th April 2020

We don't need to fill the theatre void with recordings – we need to take time to grieve, says Liam Rees.

Find out more
NSDF 2020

Technical Talk

13th April 2020

Marina Johnson finds out about life as a theatre technician.

Find out more
NSDF 2020

Voices heard

11th April 2020

Shanaé Chisholm reflects on Winsome Pinnock's workshop about writing trauma.

Find out more

Sign-up to our newsletter

Sign-up for our newsletter
Follow us
Facebook Twitter Instagram Youtube
Contact Us Coming to the Festival Frequently Asked Questions Festival Awards Young Person Protection Policy Website Accessibility Privacy Policy
© National Student Drama Festival Made by Grandad
Sign-up to our newsletter

Sign up to our newsletter to stay up to date on all our upcoming events, information and news. Read our Privacy Policy to learn more about how we process your data.