Review - La Ronde by Max Gill

“Feel alive”, “My slave”, “The burn is intense” … you enter the rustic depths of Bunker Theatre and, amongst many alarming phrases, you find these words frantically written in chalk on the back wall. You have entered a tense space where taboos are ready to be unleashed, cueing the arousal of repressed libidos and sadistic fetishes that devour humankind… but you end up laughing an awful lot instead.

Max Gill rebirths Schnitzler’s play La Ronde with a modernisation that places the series of interrelated sexual encounters in present-day London. Gill’s adaptation not only modernises the initially controversial stage-play, but entices its events in a game of chance. A wheel is spun to determine who of the four actors will play the next character, making the performance gender-blind. With themes of prostitution, infidelity, and a weird fetish for baked beans, it explores the several practices that sex can inhabit.

The main scenes rupture in frantic, animalistic sexual tension that rattle on the headboard of forbidden erotic fantasies, contrasting to the transition scenes where the wheel is spun statically by zombielike actors awaiting the verdict of their fate, however this is not nearly as substantial as it could be. Although the performance as a game of chance is enticing, the pressure this has on the cast depletes their ability to conjure up convincing human emotion and sexual passion in most scenes. The only real anticipation was in waiting for the wheel to land on Marrett Jr.

For a performance with such vulgar writings on the wall, the performance is far from uncouth and, in fact, quite the opposite. It is funny.

Perhaps it is the underground aesthetic of Bunker theatre that provides a safe space for us to laugh about such sexual taboos… or maybe Gill’s game of chance is a little too experimental for its own benefit.

picture taken from Bunker Theatre website: https://www.bunkertheatre.com/whats-on/la-ronde