Company O’s latest FRINGE show, on at Mossenson Galleries in Subiaco, is a mind-bending exploration of gender power dynamics and the relationship between an artist and their art.
Venus in Fur is a play by David Ives in which director Thomas Novachek is casting a play also called Venus in Fur which is adapted from the German novella of the 1800s also called, you guessed it, Venus in Fur. It is easier to understand when watching the play than it is to write about, promise. After failing to find an actress suitable for the character Vanda von Dunayev, Vanda Jordan swans into the audition room demanding to be considered and Thomas takes up the part of leading man Severin von Kusiemski to see what she’s got. Despite being brash and pushy, the total opposite of sophisticated Vanda of the play, Vanda the actress embodies the character perfectly and extensively, to the point that the lines of the play bleed into their real interactions, and the distinctions between their characters and themselves becomes increasingly unclear.
As Vanda and Severin navigate love, lust, and rather hastily made contract for him to become her submissive slave, Vanda and Thomas battle over their differing interpretations of the play (is it S&M porn or not?) and find it increasingly difficult to shuck off their characters between scenes.
Presumably director Andrew O’Connell saw the irony of casting himself as the lead in a play about a director who gets too involved in his play and cannot distinguish between himself and his character, but that’s getting a little meta for a short review. Either way, the two had a great rapport, their quips and power struggle keeping us engaged for ninety minutes.
We cannot know whether Codey Finlay’s audition for the part of Vanda was as complicated as her character’s, but there can be no doubt that she was perfect for the role, swapping between actress Vanda’s crass belligerence and character Vanda’s intelligent disdain with ease. She also carried off doing most of the play in dominatrix lingerie with the confidence of Aphrodite, so there’s a reason to see the show if complicated gender politics isn’t selling you on it.
Krispin Maesalu’s sound design in conjunction with Justin Neil Mosel’s lighting, enhanced the differences between the worlds of the play and of the play within the play (you can see why this needed clarification). The sound of rain outside Thomas’ audition room and the music helped with the distinction and the lack of it later on in the play when the characters began to lose touch with reality. In the art gallery space with a limited speaker system the sound levels were a little janky and occasionally harsh on the ear, but the timing of a cane swish sound was so spot on that the audience member in front of the actor swinging her empty hand jumped in his seat.
Venus in Fur is surprising, enthralling, sexy but not sexual, and kept me thinking long after I’d left the gallery.
You can see Venus in Fur at Fringe World from Feb 9-11.