Unimaginably innovative, this piece is inspiring, heartfelt and highly worthwhile watching. Interrogating audience members for years, Ontroerend Goed, in Thanks for Being Here, say a grateful “thank you”. But perhaps a sarcastic one at that, and the production plunges viewers into an out-of-body, introspective performance.
Thanks for being here is an appreciation piece for the constant stream of audience members who trickle through the doors into the ZOO Southside performance space, the people who comment on their piece fervently. The show shocks, with entrancing technological skill and suspends natural order in the best way possible.
Uncomfortable, being Ontroerend Goed’s middle name, this production plays relatively little with this in the performance. While the audience are placed under the microscope, examined by a camera which projects images of their faces onto a large sheet, this is not an “in your face” aggressive show, but an endearing, heartfelt one. The technology used, with its multiple cameras, has a wonderfully chilling quality to it. Walking through the gates, you are immediately met by the gaze of high-quality cameras and performers gathering information for the rest of the show. This is theatre like no other. Not only does this cast a narrative about the constant onlook of the state but also the passivity of audience members in “regular” theatre. Indeed, the audience always play a key role but never has the spotlight been placed on them as much as in this show. None of this is possible without the technological ingenuity utilised. I ended up leaving the space entranced and moved, concerned for onlookers and the filming from ominous cameras in the cloudy, cobbled streets of Edinburgh. It is a terrifying, uniting piece in the best way possible.
It would be criminal to reveal too much of this wonder, as it relies heavily on surprise, but the troupe of performers, Karolien De Bleser, Charlotte De Bruyne, Patricia Kargbo and Leonore Spee, deliver the piece with ease and style, rapidly creating text to perform in front of the audience, keeping the audience constantly connected to them with direct address and planted actors in the audience who enliven and embody the crowd. Thanks for Being Here is romantic, showering the audience with comedy as the performers lip-sync to the audience’s words, reclaiming their speech and adopting the physicality of audience members. This was mind-bending and challenging. It is a beautifully self-sufficient Brechtian piece, which makes the actors clearly responsible for its effects and its breathtaking technology.
Yes, the ethics of this production, inspecting audience members and even some passers-by on the street, is a challenging one, but the sentiment at this show’s core is a special one: you are excitingly watching being watched.
