Choreographed by Giovanni Zazzera

Review by Marina Funcasta

theSpace@ Surgeon’s Hall: Tickets

Crawling onto the stage, wide-eyed and expectant, Prince Imogen’s christening opens with a sense of childish play. Although lacking a religious ceremony, Wolodarsky retrospectively tugs at the golden thread that sews together the tapestry of his lifelong quest for self-understanding.

A messy thread at best, it is a testament to Wolodarsky’s vocal clarity and patiently paced physicality that the twists and turns of his experience exploring gender are so deftly performed. Describing the fun and the troubling, Wolodarsky uses the piano as a means of expressing the darker, less straightforward intricacies of the transitioning process – be it discovering the performance of gender when he was a tween in school musicals, understanding his own sexuality, or even the act of sex itself. Delving into our desires, especially when they seem at odds with the normative, requires a lot of bravery and trust of the self.

Growing up, these two notions are certainly not a given. Ebbing and flowing between moments of doubt and risk, it is unsurprising that Wolodarsky’s previously giddy demeanour dips mid-way through his performance. In a scene which merits credit for its pacing, Wolodarsky literally sits on the ground as he sifts through his dirty laundry. Hitherto filled with alacrity and infectious wonder, the curiosity of his ‘inner child’ diffuses into melancholy.

Not the one for tragedy, Wolodarksy nevertheless picks himself up. Here is where Natasha Vincent’s directing shines, using these props, which up till now had existed as symbols of lethargy, as vehicles through which Wolodarsky is able to lift himself up. Mutating into playful stepping stones, he climbs through them, jumping over the tiny archipelago of selves which they now represent. To be sure, using clothing is certainly significant – serving as expressions of how we want to present ourselves to the outside world, Wolodarsky’s dirty laundry starkly contrasts to his green co-ord. This was important, as not only is the colour crucially ungendered, but the solidity of the outfit edified Wolodarsky’s entire message.

It is in the piano, however, where I found the play’s message to reverberate. Not an unfamiliar trope, there are several shows this Fringe which similarly have turned to musical instruments as aids through which inexplicable emotional realities have been communicated; I’m Almost There and Giant on the Bridge particularly spring to mind. Unlike these performances, Wolodarsky’s one-man show modestly uses an electric Yamaha, standing proud in its industrial and pragmatic foldability. Not accompanied by any other instruments, Wolodarsky’s small stage Wolodarsky’s is made up of just him and the piano. Referred to as an instrument which helped him cope with the issues at hand, the fluidity through which Wolodarsky plays is a testament to his familiarity. A reminder that it is not our doubts and fear that make us who we are, but the way we cope with them, Wolodarsky and Vincent have created for themselves a play which beams with personal truth but universal appeal.

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