Despite reports of Thomas Ostermeier’s stylistic intransigence – this is the 41st piece he’s directed – and the play’s rather extraordinary length (4 hours and 15 minutes with intermission), The Life of Vernon Subutex 1 lives up to its name: it brims with life.
As the drama makes vivid, neoliberalism beggars us one and all – if not all in the same way.
This adaptation of the first part of Virginie Despentes’s Balzacian trilogy about Vernon Subutex, the homeless former owner of a record store, is a moving panorama of Parisian society in the face of the ravages of neoliberalism – economic, political and spiritual. Structured around the eviction of its eponymous protagonist, Ostermeier’s production takes shape as a series of stirring monologues that manage to balance the literary and the histrionic, as well as the hilarious and the poignant, to devastating effect.
With a live band rocking out between scenes, Vernon is a high-energy performance, only flagging slightly just before intermission. As has been the case across Ostermeier’s work, he ensures his cast have the time and space to fully inhabit their roles and translate the sharp script into flesh and blood. Joachim Meyerhoff’s incarnation of the wounded, oblivious, furious and pathetic protagonist deserves special praise, as does Ruth Rosenfeld’s charismatic turn as Pamela Kant, a retired porn star who philosophises on her post-porn life, the German language and her partner’s gender transition.
And yet, to single out these actors for praise cuts against the performance’s truth, which is found in the collective experience. As the drama makes vivid, neoliberalism beggars us one and all – if not all in the same way.
- Vernon Subutex 1, Sep 1-3, Schaubühne, German with English, French and Croatian surtitles
