By Srijanee Bhattacharyya
Is Angels in America, a Pulitzer prize-winning drama by Tony Kushner set during the Reagan era staged at the ‘site-specific’ Oxford Union, (which was itself once graced by Ronald Reagan himself), a match made in heaven?
The play, as ever, remains a fascinating blend of contrasts where fantasy meets gritty reality, stasis interacts with change and humour is irretrievably intertwined with emotion. It creates a harrowing, but worthwhile journey through the lives of the eight unique protagonists who deal with sexuality, identity and relationships with the flawed but understandable approaches of denial and despair. The link between the audience and the characters was enhanced through the intimate nature of the Oxford Union debating chamber, particularly with the highly commendable decision to have the actors already on stage and in character as the audience came in.
All members of the cast managed well the difficult task of acting two different roles and gave solid performances. Charlie Morrison (Roy), Colin Warriner (Prior) and Natasha Kirk (Harper) displayed wonderfully the conflicts that their characters faced. My favourite performance came from Leo-Marcus Wan, whose Mr. Lies captured the idiosyncrasies of the play but whose portrayal of Belize maintained the gravity and humanity of the circumstances the characters found themselves in. However, the performance was lacking in some other respects. The show might have benefited from a slower pace and unfortunately during a few crucial points in the performance the actors did seem to be shouting for effect. This combined with the theatre-in-the-round direction where the audience were sometimes behind the actors and the rapidity of the dialogue meant that audibility suffered and much of the nuances carefully built up to that point were lost.
Nevertheless, the staging of the play was impressive as a whole. The juxtaposition of the two confrontational scenes at the same time on stage was inspired, the first where Joe admits his homosexuality to his wife as she is gripped by mental illness and the second where Prior challenges his partner Louis, who has abandoned him while he is being ravaged by AIDS. The particular props chosen gave a distinct flavour to every scene allowing the audience to interpret exactly what was happening. This avoided confusion and the minimalist set did not distract from the drama of the play and allowed the characters to flow in and out of the scenes without breaking the relentless drive to the climax of the play.
To answer the question posed at the beginning, the show was not so much a match made in heaven but an admirable, grounded performance. It is worthwhile, especially to see some of the more poignant scenes take place in the unique setting of the Union chamber.
