Seeing Double: Vision

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Visions is Greenlight Theatre’s companion piece to Seeing Double: Figures. These two ensemble plays share actors, subject material and temporality, the cast rushing from one stage to another as a theatrical company’s ill-fated update of Macbeth threatens to fall apart as opening night approaches.

Where Figures presents the scenario from the perspective of the production team—barred from Julio Buenaventura’s rehearsals, ostensibly because the director does not want to see his ex-wife, who is the costume designer—Vision takes place backstage among the actors. Figures is essentially a straight farce; Vision is more acerbic in its critique of theatrical pretentions, replete with earnest soliloquies and over-the-top theatrical exercises ("you’re a feather drifting on the breeze").

Buenaventura, it transpires, is an imposter, an East End spiv named Craig, who, clutching a copy of Directing for Dummies, attempts to bluff his way through Macbeth, with predictably disastrous results. As with Figures, the closing 10 minutes descend into a madcap dash between venues.

The conceit behind the Seeing Double plays is a reasonably fresh one, but for those who watch both shows it will probably feel a bit wearing. Both stories are variations on a theme, and the action, while enjoyable and light-hearted, is not enough to sustain what are basically two viewings of the same play. Nevertheless, Greenlight deserves kudos for trying something different, and the energy of the performances suggests this won’t be the last we hear from this young theatre company.