Review: Outcry Theatre's THE PILLOWMAN is intense, but well worth it!

The Pillowman

by Martin McDonagh

Directed by Becca Johnson-Spinos

Produced by Outcry Theatre

Reviewed by Jenny Wood

Let me start by saying Outcry Theatre’s production of The Pillowman is really fun. 

The people sitting behind me were gasping and murmuring and laughing nervously, the friend who joined me described it as amazing. 

… it’s just a very specific kind of fun.

The Pillowman is one of the darkest of modern dark comedies, centering on a writer in an unnamed totalitarian state who is being interrogated about the gruesome content of his short stories and their similarities to a series of child murders.

Naturally, such a work contains pervasive violence, adult content, and explicit language from start to finish.

And with a run time clocking in at just under three hours, it is an experience.

Have you ever read Infinite Jest? I have not, but I have had “the experience of reading Infinite Jest” explained to me many many times. Written in 1996 by American writer David Foster Wallace, Infinite Jest is a 1,079 page encyclopedic dystopian novel including nearly 400 footnotes. 

Anytime I’ve watched a person describe actually reading Infinite Jest, their energy shifts and they get this glint in their eye that makes you wonder how the memory of reading a 1,079 page encyclopedic dystopian novel including nearly 400 footnotes could inspire such reverence. 

But on Saturday, as the lights shifted into Pillowman’s final curtain call, my eyes got wide and my head tilted and I thought, “This must be what it feels like to actually read Infinite Jest!” 

The Pillowman is very long, and dense - but the beats are all necessary to the thesis.

Outcry eases the intensity by including two 10 minute intermissions. Some people may want to leave at the first intermission - please don’t. The payoff for those who stay is totally worth it. 

The Stone Cottage set up is very small: Three rows of audience seating, with the front row within inches of the action. And almost nothing in the space to absorb sound. 

The show opens with the interrogation of writer Katurian (Bryce Lederer) by Detectives Tupolski (Ryan Maffei) and Ariel (Connor McMurray). The first half hour is so loud and sharp in such a small space that one wonders whether the auditory chaos is intentional or nerves. If they are starting this high, where do we have left to go? 

But as we move from the opening discourse into the poetry of the play, it is clear that everything in this production is intentional. 

In Act 2 we meet Michal (Will Frederick), who softens the overall tone just long enough for you to forget what the play is really about, allowing the audience to be properly caught off guard when things jump back on theme. And by the time we get to Act 3, the cast is adeptly riding the wave to its inevitable conclusion. 

The Pillowman is as much about the visual spectacle as it is about the language. Director Becca Johnson-Spinos rounds out her cast with a small ensemble – Haley Peters, Cary Bazan, and Harper Caroline Lee – who work fluidly with Cory Garrett’s set pieces and Elizabeth Cantrell’s complementary props to play out Katurian’s stories. 

Much like Frederick’s Michal softens Lederer’s Katurian, the ensemble’s reenactments soften the graphic nature of the stories just enough for the outcomes to cut that much sharper. 

I would not describe this production as immersive theatre per se, but the choice to stage this production in the Stone Cottage plays as much of a role in the overall experience as anything else. As mentioned, the front row is within inches of certain action, to the point that some portions feel like you are in a dreamscape waiting to wake up. 

There are a lot of ways for this show to be the wrong kind of loud and painful - this production gets it all just right.  Johnson-Spinos' cast and creative team execute a consistently and effectively stylized brand of storytelling reminiscent of an animated Edward Gorey's Alphabet.

If, like me, you enjoy uncomfortable subjects artfully discussed, you will thoroughly enjoy this show. The Pillowman continues through February 25, OutcryTheatre.com for tickets. 

Cheers, 

Jenny

Audience Rating: PG13 - violence, adult content, and explicit language

Run Time: 2 hours 55 minutes, including two 10 minute intermissions. 

Accessible Seating: Available 

Hearing Devices: Not Available

Sensory Friendly Performance: Not Available

Production Sound Level: Appropriate.

Noises or Visuals to Prepare For: Bangs, Pops, Hits, Gunshots, Blood Effects