Silencio Theater performs the Seductions of Fear in The Dog, the Night and the Knife
The original The Dog, the Knife, and the Night was written by Marius von Mayenburg in 2008 Germany. It is a tale of surrealism, dream states and dystopian realities. Silencio Theater company of Chicago takes on an interpretation with the weight of a fever dream, the one after a panic attack. It is reminiscent of a Nabokov short story, a sort of feeling of displacement.
Done several times throughout the country since Mayenburg’s original script, Silencio Theater has translated the absurdist REM state into their own hands through a third-floor warehouse of the Chicago West Loop. The company’s scenic designer Sean Gunderson relies on industrialist themes:
exposed brick,
flood lights (of green, sometimes blue),
props set aside for: later.
Two balloons are hanging from the rafters, perhaps from a play past-life. I consider the warehouse occupants before us.
Windows are taped up, sealed, covered in barb wire. Extension outlets weave in and out of audience seating. You can hear the air through the warehouse vents. Violin music intensifies.
Two actors wear jumpsuits, one wears layers of beige.
The one in beige is our protagonist, called M. He is played by Hal Cosentino: a man with a wound. His wound is a siren call to the dystopian land before him. Opening scene, he comes across another man, a man who has lost his dog.
The man who has lost his dog (Tom Defrancisco) is hungry. M is not, as he used to have muscles in the month of August. What calls for the distinction between hunger versus full is unexplained. The reasons seem to be ever shifting.
The man who lost his dog is killed by the beginning of the play, an accidental jab from his own knife, caused by M. What ensues hereafter is a series of other stabbings, caused by M of accidental origins, but soon collide into tactful and purposeful action.
The knife is a weapon he did not choose, now bestowed upon him. What follows is a clock, whose time never changed.
It’s always 5:05.
A.M or P.M. is unclear.
From first murder, M is greeted by a woman (Sazi Bhakti), who warns him of her sister. It is a three person show who morph into four, then five, six. Bhakti’s woman is also the sister.
Who is also the criminal,
who is also the lawyer,
the schizophrenic, then the nurse turned lover.
Dog man is the brother of the sisters,
the police,
then the patient,
doctor, then finally
the lost dog.
M is always the same, victim of mental turmoil - stuck in the 5:05 with a knife to his hand. His wound never hurts until you bring it up.
Everyone one without muscles are hungry, yet there is only one knife to go around.
Fluorescent light that leaned against walls are then manually adjusted to hang once a character change into another.
Once the characters (the police turned patient turned doctor. The sister turned criminal turned schizophrenic turned nurse…) notice M’s wound, they are disdained to see it is not deep enough.
“it is not deep enough.”
“it is not deep enough.”
“it is not deep enough.”
The warehouse is dark majority of the performance, these three actors requiring attention to feeling and script. Light changes as soon as the actors do, the horizon represented by an orange flood light, fear a dark red center stage.
At the turn of the end, Cosentino’s M is forced face to face with the lost dog of the owner he stabbed in the beginning.
The dog senses fear, and like the other characters, fear emitting from M turns the dystopia on.
The dog can smell it, calling him “A huge meal with barebones.”
The dog is Tom Defrancisco on his hands and knees, angry in red.
M kills the dog, only then does he surrender. He lets the lover in, offering his wound, yet they kiss instead.
It’s a metaphorical performance relying on the echoes of a warehouse room, scenic designs that feel raw enough to keep you grounded. A three person show, 88 minutes of prose, fear and anger.
Silencio’s The Dog, the Night, and the Knife is a play about dream states.
A play about choice and power,
Hunger with a capital H;
About the exile,
the trail of the knife,
asking “who suffers -?”
For Silencio Theater, it’s always timed at 5:05, or SOS.
Even then, they force audiences to wonder:
what are we wanting saved?
Silencio Theater Company present The Dog, the Night and the Knife. Written by Marius Von Mayenburg, translated by Maja Zade and directed by Michael Rogerson. Cast is played by Sazi Bhakti, Hal Cosentino and Tom Defrancisco. Crew includes Zoe Lesser (assistant director), Ethan Embry (stage manager), Amanda Loch (production assistant), Sean Gunderson (scenic design), Jasper Drummond (costume design), Sam Graves (sound), Collin Quinn Rice (movement), Daniel Chenard (fight direction), Kayla Menz (intimacy direction) and Anna White (illustrations). You can find Silencio online at www.silenciochicago.com.