'A Clockwork Orange' by Anthony Burgess, directed by Greg Homann
by Nkosinathi Quwe
Anthony Burgess' A Clockwork Orange was first published in 1962. Under the direction of Greg Homann in 2005 in South Africa, performed by students from the Wits School of the Arts, it is an interestingly relevant take on society.
On a simplistic level, it is about a boy by the name of Alex in the stormy years of adolescence. He is at war with himself and in search of his identity. The actors were all dressed in tight white body suits, which were accessorised strategically, highlighting the abstract and minimalist nature of the play effectively: A doctor wears a stethoscope around his neck, while a police officer wears a cap. Appropriate to the original stage directions, the soundtrack of the production featured powerful use of Beethoven, providing the play with its pace, mood and drama.
The stage set comprised white geometrical constructions onto which slide images were projected, contributing to the visual sense of busy-ness and terror in the plot itself.
In this play, Burgess addresses issues of the young male and examines what it means to be a male in a violent society: does being 'macho' really earn one respect? The main character struggles with these quandaries, trying to prove to his gang that he is a man by behaving with extreme violence.
There is a dominant linking of sex with violence in many of the issues raised and situations breached by this powerful play. Weapons carried by the gang are shaped into huge phallic symbols, demonstrating a sense of vigorous male power or animal instinct, manifested in behaviour like the marking of territory. This was explicitly demonstrated by a member of the gang who becomes oblivious to the conversation of his friends after a particularly violent scene with civilians: he faces a wall and masturbates.
The play also confronts the issue of self-destruction. Drugs are high on an agenda and the unfortunate results of drug abuse highlighted. In extrapolating on these issues Burgess not only contemplates the issue of self-destruction, but the destruction of character at a young age. Alex eventually becomes implicated in a murder and goes to jail. When he emerges not even his parents will have anything to do with him.
The play is moral, but in a startlingly visual manner, and asks pertinent questions relevant to our country and contemporary society. In response to the dominance of capricious violence in contemporary urban society a psychological experiment is performed on prisoners. They are forced to watch images of extreme violence accompanied by Beethoven's music. The experiment horrifyingly brings up problems which threaten humanity. Burgess poses a central question: is society fit to decide who is criminal, and who is not?
Burgess's play achieved a cult following after it was published over 40 years ago, but it still provides a powerful moral lesson for contemporary local youth. More than a straight theatrical production, this well-directed piece blends an understanding of performance art with traditional theatre discipline and practice, and comments on the importance and position of art in society.
Opened: April 26
Closed: May 7
Wits Downstairs Theatre
Jan Smuts Avenue, Braamfontein
Tel: (011) 717 1376
Email: pisantic@theatre.wits.ac.za
