Con-Version
VAULTFestival • 14th - 19th March
As another VAULTFestival comes to an end, it was with a slightly heavy heart that I made the journey to see my last festival production of the year. It was not only because the 2023 season was coming to an end, but also that the festival itself is in danger of closing its doors once and for all, time having been called on the lease for this much-needed and popular festival, a mainstay of the performing arts calendar since 2012. Needless to say, I was hoping to finish this years festival on a high, and whilst it was clear that a play about conversion therapy wasn’t going to be an easy watch, I had a sixth sense that this was going to be something special as, despite having no prior knowledge of playwright Rory Thomas-Howes work, I had no doubts about the performance capabilities of Elan Butler (A Little Rain In Monaco), Timothy Harker (Consumables) and previous Jack The Lad featured actor Alex Britt, (My Dad’s Gap Year, Dumbledore Is So Gay), who had all more than impressed during previous performances.
It was also not the first time I had seen the harrowing effects of conversion therapy become the subject of a powerful piece of LGBTQ+ theatre, as only last month the incredibly moving Passion (written by Tom Dalrymple and Nadav Burstein) appeared at The Lion and Unicorn Theatre in London, and alongside last years The Convert at Above The Stag, it’s clearly a topic currently at the forefront of several playwrights minds, a reflection of the snail-like pace that governments around the world are dealing (or more specifically, not effectively dealing) with an outright ban of this deeply damaging practice. What immediately marked Rory Thomas-Howes play out as being different from the others however was that he had chosen to take the narrative into the heart of the family, showing the crumbling relationships therein as the effects of their actions and increasingly questionable motives move them to crisis point. Insightful as Thomas-Howes observations prove to be, it was far from being the only element of this play that would differentiate his approach to the subject matter.
Con-Version opens with an unsettling atmosphere right from the start, as an eerie peel of church bells ring out against the sound of wind, thunder and driving rain. Amongst the flashes of lightning that accompany the storm, Mother (Ruth Redman) tries to soothe her crying baby whilst stood on top of tables arranged in the shape of a crucifix. So far, so gothic, and as the five tables get rearranged into a long dining table, (now more reminiscent of the last supper), Mother and Father (Timothy Harker) start to lay the place settings in preparation for the return home of their since estranged Son (Elan Butler). Along with Sister (Molly Rolfe) the facade of this already barely functioning family is starting to crumble, but as Son returns it becomes clear that the results of the intensive ‘reprogramming’ he has been subjected to over the last 12 months has not been successful, and the feelings he has been struggling to suppress for so long soon begin to resurface with the reappearance of the ‘Neighbours Boy’ (Alex Britt).
“All you want to do is keep your baby safe, and all they want to do is swim away”, complains the desperately controlling Mother in a bid to justify the lengths she will to go to in order to eradicate her sons true self, so that she can once again present the illusion of her god-fearing nuclear family. Her methods are ‘unconventional’ to say the least as Thomas-Howes takes his play down the path of a non-linear sensory assault where, if things are not going according to Mothers liking, she has the unworldly ability to tweak the narrative, change the story and replay any moment within it so as to produce the results she finds more palatable, all done under the guise of ‘fixing’ her son. It’s a brave structural approach, and one that comes with a modicum of confusion at first, but once the strength of the mothers misguided love, and the powers at her control becomes apparent, these time-shifting multiple scenarios become ever more intense and increasingly horrific.
This layered narrative is less ‘multiverse’, and more ‘Everything, Everywhere, All At Once”, (with a bit of ‘The Exorcist’ thrown in for good measure), and as the mania ramps up, so do the scenarios thrown at the son as the play momentarily becomes a sitcom, a silent movie and a shakespearean play, all of which have the result of making Con-Version just about as cinematic as theatre can get, an impressive achievement in itself given the limited, but well utilised set design (Lulu Tam) all enhanced by some inventive lighting (Ben Garcia) and impactful sound design (Matteo Depares).
The overall ambition of this play feels big, bold, and a unique way of approaching the subject matter as it unpacks the devastating trauma experienced through conversion therapy, and under Sam Edmunds skilful direction we find ourselves being shown a multitude of alternative realities and fictional truths, all presented as if part of a complex fever dream, possibly the result of the therapy itself. This undeniably original approach works spectacularly well on the whole, except I couldn’t help but feel that without leaving a clear through-line of reality intertwined amongst each alternative version of events, their outcome begins to feel increasingly inconsequential, given that if none of them are actually real, and can seemingly be altered or replayed without a moments notice, then does any of it matter? The answer, of course, is ‘yes’, as the tragic, and sometimes horrific sense of inevitability is brought home by the two powerful central performances from Elan Butler and Ruth Redman, and through a strong supporting cast Thomas-Howes is simultaneously able to make a lot of acute observations about family dynamics, truth and love.
Con-Version is a thought-provoking piece of theatre, successfully realising nearly all of it’s epic ambitions., and yes… seeing a production filled with this much talent was a fantastic way to conclude this years VAULTfestival experience.
★★★★
Con-Version is on at the VAULTFestival until 19th March 2022.
review: Simon J. Webb