Preview: Odyssey, Wardrobe Theatre

Island-hopping to the Wardrobe Theatre next week, Odyssey is the award-winning show from Bristol-based Theatre Ad Infinitum. The one-man retelling of Homer’s epic poem stars George Mann, Associate Director at the Bristol Old Vic, and is directed by Nir Paldi, George’s fellow TAD artistic directors.

This epic quest encompassing mythical monsters, gods, and hurricanes is told through passionate, poignant and physical storytelling. After premiering at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 2009, Odyssey toured the UK and internationally, including Norway, Milan and Toronto. Since then, Theatre Ad Infinitum have gone on to great critical acclaim with shows including Translunar Paradise, Ballad of the Burning Star (The Guardian’s Best of the Edinburgh Fringe 2013, The Stage Best Ensemble 2013 and Off West End Award 2014), Light (read our review here) and Bucket List (Spirit of the Fringe Award 2016).

Here are George and Nir to tell us more.

What made you want to tell the Odyssey as a one-man show? What are the gains of doing it this way, and are there any losses?
George: We run regular masterclasses, and in one of them there’s an exercise called ‘the painting’. It asks participants to paint an imaginary landscape on an imaginary canvas, and then bring that landscape to life using everything you have at your disposal as a performer – mainly, the body; then you present to the group. It’s a great way for people to find their gestural, storytelling body.
When I first did this exercise during my two years of Lecoq School training in Paris, it really struck a chord with me – I love gesture, poetics, mime and making sound effects – and through this exercise, I could encompass it all in one idiomatic theatrical language. Nir and I wanted to tell a story using the language I had found as a style. After lots of research, we couldn’t find anything that felt right – and then one day, at a book market, I stumbled upon a children’s version of Homer’s The Odyssey, a beautiful little red book that was falling to pieces. Reading it I felt sure this could be the story, so I bought the real thing, and I couldn’t put it down – written thousands of years ago, I couldn’t believe how brilliant a story it still was to this day. And it seemed like an almost impossible feat – to tell the story of Homer’s Odyssey, one man, in just over one hour. We had to do it. 

You’ve “had to push hard to find the precise world of Homer’s Odyssey“. What is that world?
The world we have found brings together the classical and the modern; the ancient Greek mythical world with all of its magic and imagination, with the fast-moving cinematic experience more familiar to us today. We do that using the body of one performer on the stage alone with no set – just an empty space that we fill with the audiences imagined world. 
The performance we have created draws on traditional oral storytelling, pared back to the simple space that has existed between storyteller and audience since humans first started telling stories around fires thousands of years ago. We’ve tried to honour this tradition – but we’ve updated it too, so that audiences experience a visceral, thrilling Odyssey that’s as moving and exciting today as it was when Homer first wrote it. We have tried our best to tell Homer’s beautifully complex story, and make it as accessible as we could without losing the heart, detail, poetics or sophistication that has made his poem stand the test of time.
Essentially though, the core of The Odyssey, at least for us, resides in the human tale of one man’s 20-year, agonising, heartfelt struggle to get home so he can be reunited with his beloved wife and son – and get his bloody revenge on the men and women who have betrayed him in his absence. I believe that’s why it keeps on going, we’ve toured for seven years to over 20 countries and performed in all sorts of different spaces, from village halls in Ithaca, Greece, to the Winter Olympic stadium in Lillehammer, Norway.

Is the Odyssey’s enduring popularity down the centuries simply due to its heady mix of bravery, adventure, and exotic characters and locations? Or is there more than that?
There are many reasons: some of which I mention above. To name a few more…
It’s one of the best stories ever told, in my view. The emotional journeys of Odysseus, Penelope and Telemachus are universal, we don’t only relate to them today – we feel them profoundly as part of the human condition. Built into The Odyssey are many other stories and characters: all of them, be they god or mortal, have tales we can relate to on many levels. It’s also hilarious – such as the story of the One-Eyed Cyclops, it’s thrilling as Odysseus slaughters the suitors in the bloody battle in the great hall in the penultimate book (there are 24 books in the Odyssey, we would probably call them chapters today); poignant when we experience the touching reunion between Odysseus and Penelope, and exciting when Odysseus is fighting hurricanes, monsters, Gods and flawed human beings… all so he can get home to his family. Aside from all of that, it’s incredibly well written and all of it in poetic form – making it a stunning and timeless read. 

One man creating all these characters, islands etcetera with his body – must be quite an undertaking. Which are the most challenging to portray?
There are many challenging aspects to performing The Odyssey: nailing each character, space, sound, voice, atmosphere, rhythm etcetera each night is always difficult. But for me, it’s getting through the entire story that is both exhilarating and exhausting at the same time. I’m always aware that audiences don’t only see the story of one man tested to the limits of his endurance, they also see me, the actor, tested to my own limits too. Both Odysseus and I are fighting to get to our journey’s end – and there’s something poetic about that which Nir and I love.

How fit do you have to keep on tour?
Very. I do lots of yoga, bike riding and cardiovascular exercise (usually crazy dancing to music I love) as well as vocal preparation, so I can get through each performance. But the show itself is a great way to keep fit as it demands I use my whole body. After seven years of touring it has become a part of me, a tradition and a ceremony that I really love performing. 

You’re both Bristol-based. What brought you both here, and how do you find it as a base for making theatre?
After numerous gruelling interviews with a panel led by Tom Morris, I won the National Theatre and Bristol Old Vic’s Quercus Trust Award in December 2014 and became the Associate Director at Bristol Old Vic. They were happy for me to take on the role part time so I could continue running Ad Infinitum with Nir, but in order to do the job, Tom asked me to move to Bristol to be part of the community here. Nir and I are a couple as well as colleagues co-running Ad Infinitum; we had a long chat about it all and decided to try it. We moved in June 2015, along with our company and arrived in Bristol. It’s a great city, we already liked it after touring to the Old Vic for years with the company, but we were nervous about living here and leaving our previous home, London.
It’s been a year and half now, and I can happily say we don’t regret moving here one bit! We’ve made loads of friends, we love the city, its vibe and the rich culture and theatre scene here. I love being at Bristol Old Vic too – such a great theatre and a brilliant team of people working there. I was so well supported for the first production I co-directed, Pink Mist, and the play itself is set in Bristol, moving from the Thekla to the Tunnels and all the way up Dundry Hill… it was the perfect way to begin life in Bristol.
We also love the sense of community here: artists that work together and support each other, but also the community we live in in St George too. Every time I leave Bristol I miss it and when I return, it makes me so happy. Sounds cheesy I know, but its true – we love it here. 

Theatre Ad Infinitum’s Odyssey is at the Wardrobe Theatre from Tuesday, November 22 to Saturday, November 26. For more info and to book tickets, visit www.thewardrobetheatre.com/livetheatre/odyssey