Elegy was hidden away in the Vaults’ furthest space, reached by climbing up creaking metal stairs and waltzing through an arts display of dripping lace and jewelled glitz. But inside the old, dust-filled rococo cinema space, converted into a faded glamour theatre, there were just four fluorescent strip lights shining and a lone chair. The strip lights were arranged into the shape of a box on the ground.
By Patrick Cash
As the house lights died, out came one-man powerhouse actor Adam Best to stand in this stark, bare box. He began talking of two boys and their friendship. They were both gay and lived in ‘post-liberation’ Iraq.
Based on interviews with gay Iraqi refugees, ‘Elegy’ was produced by internationally minded touring theatre company Transport. It’s the little details that create the authenticity of the story: the boys’ easy intimacy, in the midst of much hatred. They wondered if they might become lovers, but no they were just friends. One is more darkly beautiful than the other.
Yet one is caught and executed, as the other has to watch in the crowd. His helplessness in this situation, the brutal pathos, is beautifully wrought by writer-director Douglas Rintoul and Best’s poignant, Kalashnikov narrative. This is when the surviving boy knows he has to leave his birthplace.
The following narrative sees our protagonist smuggle through the travails of illegal immigration into Europe, which he believes will be a land of milk and honey. But he finds himself morphed from hated in his home country for his sexuality, to another equally vilified minority in these countries: an immigrant. Just because the streets feel more peaceful does not mean he is any more welcome.
And when he is arrested and placed in an illegal immigrants’ detention centre, the purpose of the box becomes clear: it is a cell. But Best is in the cell for the entirety of the remarkable performance. This boy has not just been imprisoned now in the actuality of this prison, he’s been imprisoned his entire life by other people’s hate. A strong, valuable piece of theatre.
• The Vaults, Leake Street, SE1 7NN
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