The Yellow Wallpaper theatre review: A call for empathy
This dance retelling of Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story uses immersive, frantic movements to mirror female entrapment as the protagonist descends into madness
With all that we now know about mental health, it seems staggering that anyone ever thought keeping a mother and baby apart, and starving a woman with post-natal depression of stimulation, was a good idea. When American author Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote The Yellow Wallpaper in 1892, however, the mind-numbing ‘rest cure’ was deemed a good idea (for those who could afford it, of course). So much of this short story resides inside the protagonist’s head, staging it with enough dynamism to keep an audience hooked is no small task. But New York-based sister team Caitlin Ort (director) and Megan Ort (lead role) strike the perfect balance of energetic movement and nuanced mental decline.
Flanked by three dancers (a physical Greek chorus echoing her increasingly frayed mind with their movement) and lacking agency, purpose or company, our heroine becomes fixated on the wallpaper in her bedroom. Behind it, she is convinced, a woman is struggling to get out and she must free her. In an era when most of our brains are over-stimulated, the prospect of having nothing to do feels perhaps even more claustrophobic than when the story was first published. It also prompts questions about the ways in which women still aren’t being listened to.
The Yellow Wallpaper, Greenside George Street, until 29 August, 4.05pm; picture: Jacob Hiss.