PARALLEL LINES | STAGE REVIEW
Chapter Arts Centre, Cardiff, Thurs 21 Nov
Having just seen Rachel Trezise’s Tonypandemonium, part of me did a tiny sigh at seeing yet another mother and daughter onstage at the beginning of Katherine Chandler’s Parallel Lines. Tart mother: check. Rebellious daughter: check again. A kitchen scene, once more… But that is where the similarity ended. ‘This will have to be amazing’, I told myself. I was not disappointed.
Set in the kitchens of two ‘couples’ – mother and daughter, husband and wife – Parallel Lines swiftly showed in its first two scenes the differences in dynamic between the pairs, as well as in their class/lifestyle. Even before speaking, we learned a lot about the characters through small details – teenager Steph (Rachel Redford) enters the space still wearing her nightie, legs bare, as if still a little girl (she is not). She dips her finger in the sugar bowl (again like a child)… then steals some money from her mother’s purse. Conversely, wife Julia, in the adjacent kitchen, enters fully, and immaculately, dressed, ready for a day teaching at school. She is silent, self-contained, seemingly in control, precise. The working-class kitchen blares local, scandal-led news stories and trashy pop music. The middle class home, of course, is switched on to BBC Radio 6. The intimations and associations by these two actresses in their wordless entrances were, I thought, wonderful.
The story itself is set around the fact that an ‘accusation’ has been made by Steph against her male teacher, Simon (husband to Julia). However, nothing much has been done about it, it seems. There is some confusion as to what actually occurred, with total honesty not forthcoming from either the girl or the teacher. Before the truth finally emerges, in an extremely hard-hitting final scene, Simon and Julia’s relationship disintegrates, while Steph seems to find a sort of power in her powerless position. I particularly loved the scene in which, following an argument with her mother, she begins dancing, and we see her transform from kid to woman, gyrating on the kitchen table like a lap dancer. A child’s rebellion, a teenager’s anger, and a grown woman’s acceptance of herself as possessing that ability to attract male attention, all here seemed compellingly intermingled.
Extremely well-acted, then, with some touches of humour, the end result was a stunning, highly emotive drama that is still resonating with me today. A well-woven tale examining where power truly lies… Excellent.
words MAB JONES