3/5 stars
Having created an art installation using ‘the string’, a webbed structure filled with cat pictures, doodles, nudes, insults and dickpics, the characters of new student drama String find themselves in awe and fear of the ever-growing sculpture. Constructed with a mixture of framed narratives and fourth-wall-breaking meta-scenes in which the protagonist breaks character and discusses the play with the ‘author’ (also on stage), notions of dependency, security, privacy, and powerlessness surrounding the internet are brought to light in Lauren Jackson’s clever and charming production.
String is a wonderful example of how great rapport between actors can carry the narrative. With a script that is sometimes repetitive and slow-paced, the small cast of four effortlessly gave the story plenty of life. Moments of physical stillness were kept vibrant by the high level of energy and charisma maintained by each member. Joe (James Tibbles), in particular, was a delight to watch, especially when performing the voice of The King of the Piskies in a funny and calculated manner, injecting vigour into the show just at the moment it was needed.
The mysterious string is the focal point of both action and set. One character notes of the choice of prop that they ‘stuck some stuff on a fucking string’, and it would be hard to argue with this assessment. And yet, it somehow works really well – after all, a physical reconstruction of the internet would probably be as chaotic as that sculpture. It is, in fact, strangely minatory and a fascinating interpretation of how something as physically mundane as a piece of string can be used to create such a sense of paranoia.
That’s not to suggest that the show was without problems. The meta-scenes were disruptive and all-too-often purposeless. These alternate scenes undermined the building of tension and led to a sudden and anti-climactic ending. This was so frustrating because Jackson’s art installation narrative had a very good structure, which was unnecessarily risked on these postmodern interludes. Whether or not it is true, characters out of action proclaiming that their scenes are too weird, not weird enough, too complicated or saying ‘this bit literally has no point to it’ will make its audience re-evaluate, and might even make them dangerously likely to agree with these opinions. This is something that should have been avoided as it was needlessly easy to focus on weaknesses in the performance. As one character says to the author “you only just avoided that student play stereotype”, he immediately condemned it as having failed to do so. It is a great pity as without this framing it could have been a really strong show, but it is impossible to pretend that these otiose, sub-Pirandello parts did not detract from the whole.
That being said, String is otherwise a very original and thought-provoking piece with a peculiarly magnetic cast. It captures the weirdness of the oversharing internet culture, the ease with which we can access intimate details of the lives of others, the way in which the internet can hold us captive, even addict us, and the power it can have over our own personalities. The haunting refrain repeated throughout the play – “the string is the thing” – has the insistent quality of a Brave New World mantra, a reminder that the internet is the enervating soma of our own time. A little more focus on this, and a little less on the selfaware metaness, could have raised the show up to greater heights.
