Title and Deed by Will Eno

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Stepping into the light comes a traveller. He says not where he is from, nor where he is going. Simply that he is here, but not from around here. Not like us, we who are from here.

Being “not from here” is a key theme in American playwright Will Eno’s Title and Deed; a philosophical monologue exploring the idea of displacement, homelessness (in all senses of the word) and isolation. Having travelled across the United States, where it has been favourably compared with the stylings of Samuel Beckett, there is a melancholic, distinctively Irish sensibility to the production that goes beyond actor Conor Lovett’s gentle timbre.

But, while there is clear beauty in the script, there is also something patently missing here. Eno’s lone wanderer is never quite imbued with the authority he requires, remaining studiously anonymous, tortuously insubstantial. Our nameless protagonist is a mere blank slate; a conduit through which Eno’s musings on loneliness, home and home-sickness is delivered. There are occasional flashes of substance, as our man cries out with angst or beats himself around the leg with his stick, suggesting that a revelation of something—anything—personal or real might be seconds away. But instead, Title and Deed retreats back into abstraction; solidity, character and place drift once again away. The questions are never answered: who is this man, and why should we listen to him?

The effect, for all the captivating and melancholic lyricism of Lovett’s performance, is rather dissatisfying.