Dark drama sheds light on issue of retribution

THE Henley Amateur Operatic and Dramatic Society’s next fringe production is a dark three-hander that explores issues around retribution.

Death and the Maiden is a psychological thriller, which was written by Chilean playwright Ariel Dorfman in 1990.

In 1994, it was made into a film starring Sigourney Weaver, Ben Kingsley and Stuart Wilson, directed by Roman Polanski.

The protagonist, Paulina Salas, is a former political prisoner from an unnamed country in Latin America, who was raped by her captors, among whom was a sadistic doctor.

Paulina never saw his face but the doctor spoke and played Schubert’s String Quartet No 14 in D minor, Death and the Maiden, during the assault.

Years later, she comes into contact with the doctor once again and recognises his voice. How will she act and will she want revenge?

Mark Wilkin, who is directing the HAODS production, wants to put his own directorial stamp on the play.

“I’m not a huge fan of the film,” he says. “I mean, there’s some fine acting in it but I’m not a fan of the way that Polanski staged it and filmed it, but that’s just me.

“I think it’s often the case that when you’ve read something, you have images in your mind as to what something should be like. It’s the same with transferring novels to films, sometimes it just doesn’t work.

“I mean, the film works okay but it’s not as dark and intense as I hope our production will be.

“Imagine that you’re living in a country that some years ago had a brutal and bloody military coup and during that coup you were dragged off the streets and blindfolded, tied up and subjected to abuse and rape.

“And there was a doctor present and his role was to ensure that when they gave you electric shocks, they didn’t do it in a way that would kill you and that doctor got involved in the abuse.

“Now fast-forward to the present day. Your husband, who is a lawyer — and he was the one you were protecting all those years ago — has just been called to the capital to meet with the president.

“That day, he has been offered a role on a body that’s going to investigate the deaths during the coup but the investigations will be limited and they’re not going to publish names.

“Then you’re in a beach house in the middle of nowhere. Your husband comes back and he has brought back by a guy who’s a doctor and you believe this is the doctor who was present when you were interrogated.

“What do you then do? What would you do? What would you want to do?”

The three characters in the play are Paulina, who will be played by Liz Mente-Bishop, her husband Gerardo Escobar (Jake Willett) and Dr Roberto Miranda (Geoff Watts).

Mark says: “I’m blessed with my cast, I have to say.

“Liz is a professional actress. Next year she’s going to appear on our TV screens and is going to be filming a feature-length film, with a script which she tells me has won more than 60 awards.

“In rehearsal, she’s absolutely brilliant and she is going to be fantastic on stage, too.

“Jake is another great actor. He was in Blackadder earlier this year and he directed Our House, the musical.

“Geoff lives in Bix. He’s chair of one of the local solicitors and he plays netball for Henley.

“This is his real debut on stage. He decided late in life that acting is something that he wanted to do, so he did a course at the City Academy drama school and he’s going to be great.”

Dorfman is a Chilean citizen who is now a professor in America with dual citizenship. Mark says: “He has been at pains to say that this play could be set anywhere and indeed it coul but it’s clearly influenced by what happened with General Pinochet’s 1973 coup in Chile, which was astonishingly brutal.”

Dorfman was a cultural and press adviser to Fernando Flores, the chief of staff for President Salvador Allende, who was killed in the coup.

Mark says: “The judicial review which Gerardo Escobar is appointed to is remarkably similar to a body which they set up in Chile the year after this play was first performed. If you’re going to bring peace to a country that has been through such a brutal regime, how do you go about it?

“Do you seek vengeance from those people? Because a lot of them are still in power, they’re the judges, they’re the policemen, they’re the bureaucrats.

“All these questions are being asked by the play. They’re all complicit in what happened, so what do you do?”

• Henley Amateur Operatic and Dramatic Society presents Death and the Maiden at the HAODS Studio in New Street, Henley, from Thursday to Saturday, October 26 to 28 at 7.45pm. Tickets cost £12. For more details and to buy tickets, visit www.ticketsource.co.uk/
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