Raina von Waldenburg’s play 12 Minute Madness starts simply: a janitor sweeps the bare stage before the MC, one face of protagonist Marlena von Twattenburg, makes introductions. It’s a gentle introduction to a show that very quickly, and with full intention, becomes uncomfortable, offensive, and thought-provoking.
The show explores the psyche of Marlena after she recovers a memory of being sexually abused by her grandfather. This is Raina’s true story, and she tells a portion of it herself—in a heartrending meta-narrative moment of forgiveness, she cradles one character in her arms. Most of the story, however, is told through a highly kinetic and comedic cast. Employing movement-based theatre and improvisation along with the script, these twelve women build an explosion of a story.
Nothing is sacred on this stage. It’s a survivor’s roast: the characters are caricatures with exaggerated mannerisms and accents, which is meant to take away the quality of human-ness to them. They’re not people here, they’re facets of a psyche. That doesn’t, and shouldn’t, lessen the offensiveness of the play. When Deena appears—a black character written by a white woman and portrayed by an Asian actor—it’s problematic. So is the depiction of the mob-boss character. So is the eight-year-old girl who is overtly sexualized. These discomforts, and many more, stayed with me throughout the play.
As an audience member, being confronted with the offensive material was often too much. I wasn’t okay with it. I wasn’t sure how to react. I was, however, caught up in the play and the obvious care these actors were taking with the story, with each other, and with the audience. There was a sense of trust and love between the actors and between Raina and the audience that permeated everything. This didn’t make the slurs or stereotypes okay—at one point the cast reacts with a cathartic, verbal and physical rejection of a slur, a relief worth repeating—but it gave the offensive aspects a context that served to empower the actors and audience.
So I stored the complexity of these moments in my body, and then on my walk home was able to question and explore my own reactions. I realized that perhaps it was supposed to be too much. Perhaps pushing the political incorrectness over the edge into blatant slurs was meant to expose the raging offense that is sexual abuse. Each problematic moment added itself to the audience’s growing anger, it added to a conversation, and then it required careful consideration. It required us all to think.
The theatricality of this story is gripping, the story equal parts physicality and speech. There is a beautiful, furious dance, driven by a chanted fuck, fuck. And when the actors emerge from within the characters in moments of high emotion, when accents fade and caricatures become honest expressions, it’s a powerful breath of pathos.
There’s a lot to be found in 12 Minute Madness. A lot of movement and rage, vulgarity and vulnerability, volume and silence, love and pain. This show is not easy, but it is necessary.
12 Minute Madness runs at the Cultch’s Historic Theatre May 23 & 25-27. Schedule and tickets: www.upintheairtheatre.com.
Sarah Higgins graduated with her Creative Writing MFA from UBC in 2016, with reams of workshopped writing, a 4-hour stage play thesis and a world of inspiration to prove it. She began reviewing theatre for PRISM in school, and is delighted to continue to do so now that she’s working for the circus. (Literally).