A window’s peep into a myriad of lives
A platform stands alone in the library of the British Council with several plain wooden boxes stacked behind- the backdrop for Mind Adventures newest project “Better Than Ever Before”. The show’s two member cast- Arun Welendawe-Prematilleke and Alice Malseed dressed in jeans, cotton shirts and boots idly roam about the limited stage, warming up for the evening’s programme.
It’s a cocktail of feelings that macerate through an audience seated at a Mind Adventures production. With original plays such as Paraya, Rondo and Only Soldiers under their belt, the theatre group stays true to their name with original plays, punchy dialogue and gritty, intimate backdrops and visual craft.
Their latest dramatic exploit “Better than Ever Before” staged earlier this month was no different. The performance was put together by the British Council, Sri Lanka and Arts Council of Northern Ireland. Mind Adventures’ Arun Welandawe Premathilake and Alice Malseed; a theatre artist from Northern Ireland converged their writing, directing and acting chops along with mutual ideals of growing up in post conflict Sri Lanka and Northern Ireland.
The play opens to the uncomfortable buzz of bees. It’s a sound that the audience gets used to during the course of the play. Within the 50 minute run, we are invited into the lives of different characters set around a multi-storied apartment complex, set in post conflict cities. Influenced by the Mahavamsa and Irish mythology, both actors allow their audiences a glimpse into the hollow, angsty lives of the young in fast growing Belfast and Sri Lanka.
The collection of stories moves seamlessly from scene to scene courtesy the wooden boxes which Alice and Arun shape into rooms, skyscrapers, staircases and claustrophobic one man forts which they occasionally huddle into. Accompanied by simple prose and angry monologues, the performance had a tendency to slide toward monotony which could have been avoided with more interactive dialogue between the two- actor cast.
Allowing the audience a window’s peep into a myriad of diverse lives- from a ‘daddy’s little princess’ , a frustrated young mason to an unfulfilled middle class druggie, both Arun and Alice however succeeded in carrying out each piece with a consistent punch and energy. Indulging in the frustration and bitterness of young people trying to keep pace with fast emerging concrete jungles, the alienation and abandonment of the characters was cleverly brought out by sometimes haunting, sometimes mechanical recitations only broken by the unsettling buzz of bees bouncing off the walls of the stark quiet of the library, ironically enveloped by a busy Colombo night.