Review: Midnight Movie at the Royal Court, starring Nadia Nadarajah

Review by Donna Williams.

Midnight Movie, a play written by Eve Leigh and directed by Rachel Bagshaw, ran at the Royal Court theatre from 27th November to 21st December. It addresses the modern, now normalised phenomenon of having an online persona, a permanent metaphysical, digital avatar in contrast to our own impermanent, unreliable physical bodies. 

Brilliantly perfomed by Nadia Nadarajah and Tom Penn, who worked together to bring the play to life with Nadia signing and Tom voicing the lines, they skilfully weaved together the disparate narratives with physicality, moving between the stories almost seamlessly. Their timing was spot on, always in step with each other – and the creative captions which were projected behind them throughout the play. 

The creative captions themselves were well-designed and well thought through; white on dark blue background with easily-readable font and size, and well placed according to where each actor was at the time.

When Tom and Nadia were centre stage, the captions were directly above them. As they moved around, the captions moved accordingly so that the actors weren’t blocking them but not so far away that one had to turn their head to read them and miss the action, one could just flick their eyes between caption and action.

I have to give props to the thought that went into them, the only blip being when the Venus de Milo was across the stage and directly in front of a couple of lines of dialogue. If that’s my only complaint, they were pretty good. 

The set was a bedroom in an attic with a bed, a drum kit – which Tom made good use of – and various bits and pieces. The set was darkly lit with spotlights for actors; the intention was to blur the lines between the physical world and the online 2D world.

Nadia and Tom, or Avatar 1 and Avatar 2 respectively, wore white suits that stood out starkly and enhanced the slight unreality of their situation; avatars acting out the weird and sometimes unnerving stories their narrator found online in their endless search for an escape from insomnia and pain. 

The heart of the story was that narrator; an invisible yet inescapable presence in the bed, controlling the avatars via the strings of an internet connection and an active imagination and at times speaking directly through them. Sometimes it was quite philosophical musings on the abilities of the digital persona, how they far surpass our physical bodies. Our bodies break down and die, but our avatars live on, moments and stories preserved online. 

This was by no means a simple play and I give all credit to Nadia Nadarajah for her beautiful, clear performance in BSL, to Brian Duffy the BSL consultant and to Eve Leigh and Rachel Bagshaw for their commitment to making sure all audiences were included, up to and including Tom Penn (audio) describing what was happening in brief scenes with no dialogue and creating an online ‘digital body’ – people who cannot make the show, or in my case, who are simply curious, can sign up via email will receive content linked to and inspired by the show, created by the team behind the show. 

All in all, an immersive experience that was at various times playful, disturbing and thought provoking and I hope to see more from all involved in the future.

Review by Donna Williams.