The Outcry :

Perfect portraying of feelings

Nilma Dole

It was definitely a rare treat when the local theatrical circles witnessed two characters weave through a multitude of emotions like Hasini and Mark did in Tennesse Williams' The Outcry directed by drama guru Namel Weeramuni. From humour to sadness and fear to pain, the roles of Claire and Felice were effectively portrayed with stunning depth and reality by these performers melting and moving the audience with sudden bursts of excitement and emotion.

It takes real concentration power to really understand the real - how what when how why they act but it's also a powerful reminder of how it would have been for Tennesse Williams as the play is autobiographical. When Williams was five years old, he was diagnosed with diphtheria that caused his legs to be paralyzed but his mother encouraged him to make up stories by giving him a typewriter when he was 11.

However, living with an abusive father, Cornelius Williams and mood-disoriented mother, Edwina Dakin, Tennessee found inspiration in his problematic family to write. Maybe the 'Outcry' was a series of plays (including his award-winning 'Streetcar Named Desire') dedicated to his beloved sister Rose, a slim beauty who was diagnosed with schizophrenia at a young age. Mentally-disabled Rose underwent a drastic treatment called pre-frontal lobotomy, thought to help some mental patients authorized by her parents but the operation incapacitated her for the rest of her life.

Williams never forgave his parents and her surgery may have contributed to his alcoholism and drug-taking but he forged a close bond with his sister since they were both trapped in a mentally-challenged world.

With effect to that, the drama revolves around two siblings trying to make ends' meet by acting and performing, possibly as Tennesse was familiar about the subject. Says Namel Weeramuni about the play, "It's a powerful piece of play about a brother and sister who are touring as a theatre group from region to region".

He further adds, "On the surface, the play concerns a brother and sister, both actors on tour in a small town. The other players and the company manager have abandon them and now they are penniless.

The action, such as it is, takes place before, during and after a performance of 'The Two-Character Play', which involves the murder of a mother by a father and his subsequent suicide making it a play within a play".

Williams, who is said to have taken a decade to make this play described it as, "Reality and fantasy interwoven with terrifying power as two actors on tour - brother and sister - find themselves deserted by the troupe in decrepit."

The drama starts when Felice (played by Micheal Hager) prepares and writes the role of a drama he's about to perform to a make-believe audience and eventually finds that the rest of the members of their company have abandoned them because Clare (played by Hasini Somawardena) and him are considered to be 'insane'.

However, he convinces Clare that the show the must go on and proceed to create a part for her to perform in a 'Two Character Play' script. But she turns out to be a 'salacious, solipsistic spellbound, stage sorcerer surreally sardonically, shamelessly, sadistically showcasing, sanctifying and subordinating a stifled star-struck sleep-starved seductive scene-stealing sister'.

The powerful role played by Hasini reflected how genteel nature collides with nymphomania which is maddened with her brother adding fuel to the flame.

Banging the piano as a sign of attention from her brother and trying to call a reverend to find help amidst the trauma at home, the role of Clare comes across as a real in-your-face, I-just-can't-ignore and oh-my-god feeling especially when it comes to her alcoholism. Felice is more down-to-earth but the way he practices and performs his role for the stage is more energetic and lively.

Yet in the limelight, they have brilliant chemistry on stage and they come across as determined and professional performers who have the ability to turn the audience around with their hive of emotions.