
Featured image: Jeremy Waters as Richard. Photo: Clare Hawley
One protagonist, Richard Wagner, is obviously received and revered but for some in the audience, the other name, Adolf Hitler, is part of living memory. My mum remembers the chaos and the Movietone newsreels of the time and several people of my acquaintance have family who were caught up in the holocaust of the National Socialist German Workers’ Party. So, a play that puts this odium on stage in front of you … a gay heart, a Jewish soul, a gypsy heritage might quake to see. However, DRESDEN, playing at the Kings Cross Theatre, is not to be feared.
Playwright Justin Fleming has created a warm text that for most of its 80 minutes floats with a balance of emotion and intellect before delivering the challenge of a hard landing question to take away with you. Here there is density without heaviness and entertainment without escapism allied with a rigorous interrogation of the profundity and complexities of power in great art. And love, or the lack thereof. Continue reading DRESDEN AT KXT: NOT WHAT ONE MIGHT EXPECT