FFWD Weekly
Copyright © 1998 All Rights Reserved.
| THEATRE Dangerous Obsession Mark and Sally Driscoll meet John Barrett at a trade show at the Marriott hotel. But when John shows up on their doorstep a year-and-a-half later claiming that the two of them caused a fatal car accident, it's not just a mystery about the nature of ultimate truth, it's a character study that probes the extent to which ordinary people will go to hide or rewrite the truth, even as they come to believe in their own lies. Tim Koetting, newly arrived in Calgary after nine years in Stratford, Ontario, plays Mark in the Pleiades Theatre rendition of N.J. Crisp's psychological drama, Dangerous Obsession. According to Koetting, the play encourages people to question themselves and their interpretation of reality. It forces them to think about the fibs, social lies and distorted stories we all tell. "One of the characters mentions a man in his 30s who was diagnosed with a serious eye condition. He said he never realized he had it because he just assumed this is what everybody saw. So I think there's that idea: this is what I want, so therefore this is what is. The play also looks at the lengths people will go to to convince themselves of that." Set designer John Farwell realizes the dramatic tension within the physical environment itself. Using a new feature of the recently updated Pleiades Theatre, a fully revolving stage, he creates a round meditative space that initially locks the characters out and then, once it revolves open, holds them there while they walk in circles. Director John Paul Fischbach says the set allows the characters to wind and unwind emotionally within the literal confines of the truth they're seeking. "Nobody can leave," Fischbach explains. "Everybody's stuck in the same room struggling for peace, honesty and contemplation - for everything that this Zen garden setting is about.... At the end of the play, I'm hoping you won't condemn any of the characters. You can understand why Mark did what he did. You can understand why Sally lives the life she does. You can understand why the weirdo who shows up had to do it." But even understanding the motives, Koetting admits it can be difficult to portray his character, Mark, one of the play's darkest figures. "It's a challenge finding that level of total self-absorption and total disregard for anything other than my needs and what is going to be pleasant and convenient for me." Successful and ambitious, Mark is not a man to be messed with. So when John arrives on the scene with his allegations, it's no surprise that Mark is less than enthusiastic. "John is sort of like a fly that won't go away and Mark is not the kind of person who suffers fools gladly.... He is in some ways typical of a lot of people today who have gotten caught up in the possessions and the image. Anything that is going to interfere with that is just an inconvenience that has to be dealt with." With such a small cast and psychologically intense script, Fischbach has worked hard at establishing a sense of absolute trust and permission during rehearsals - an environment that contrasts sharply with the lies, mistrust and suspicion occurring on stage among the characters. "As actors, Tim and Michael (**** ) have to develop incredible trust because there's a gun waving around. So they have to establish, actor to actor, that every time Michael does this it's going to be safe, so that Tim can then play terrified, scared to death.... He's now free to play that emotion. He doesn't have to wonder, 'Is this actor going to hurt me?'" |