Word: katurian
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...score, though used sparingly, enhances the production’s chilling tone. In Katurian’s confession scene, a spooky, romping rock riff injects the play with electric energy. At other times, the faint, haunting sounds of a children’s choir waft over Katurian narrating his horrid tales or characters recounting painful memories...
Isabel Q. Carey ’12 conveys through her body the psychological destruction of her mind. In the scene where Katurian rescues her from torture, the pair rise and fall together in a dance sequence that captures the heartbreakingly graceful fragility of their limp and beaten bodies. Later, Carey imbues her psychologically stunted character with charming youthful energy, pulling at her toes, stretching her arms, and kicking up her feet in a convincing portrayal of youthful vibrancy. Carey navigates her role with nuance, as she is able to realize the wide-eyed, giggly antics of Michal without verging...
Tupolski (Jackson M. Kernion ’12) and Ariel (Dan J. Giles ’13), the detectives who keep Katurian in custody, complete the cast. The pair effectively opens with the classic “good cop, bad cop” routine, only to reverse their roles as the plot develops. Kernion is cool, cunning, and calculated, while Giles positively burns with aggression and rage, lashing out in fury at the slightest provocation. Giles’s thundering demeanor is artfully tempered, however, by the presence of a few childlike habits, such as a penchant for sucking...
...evokes the sense of claustrophobia in “The Pillowman”—psychological because of the brutal torture the detectives inflict on Katurian and physical because of the intense proximity mediated by the space of the Loeb Ex itself. The set incorporates a giant translucent box, an even smaller cage imposed in the room where Katurian is imprisoned. The box is meant to represent the room where Michal was tortured as a child. Whether illuminated with sinister green neon during a scene of violence, or adorned along its edges with garlands of somber flowers in moments...
...Pillowman” raises a number of darkly philosophical questions about the accountability of the mentally ill in violent crimes, the responsibility artists have for the emotions provoked by their art, and, perhaps most painfully, whether victims of violent abuse are ever capable of healing. Katurian seems to provide an answer to this final uncertainty when he snarls at his sister, “There are no happy endings in real life!” “The Pillowman” does not have a happy ending either—but it is this raw and unflinching exploration...