Writer: Gillian McIver
Director: Jagoda Kamov
As the Camden Fringe Festival comes to an end for another year, it is an opportunity for all the shows that have participated to consider their feedback and, however positive their show’s review, to decide how to develop their material. And there are some key considerations that have emerged across a number of Fringe shows that also apply to Apologia, one of the last to play at the Old Red Lion Theatre, a biographical explanation of the life of Alessandro Cagliostro written by Gillian McIver which sets out to restore the reputation of the globetrotting magician.
From his boyhood in Messina to the companion of monarchs and great men, Alessandro Cagliostro is here to tell his own life story, an attempt to counter the lies and misinterpretations committed to history by his enemies. From learning alchemy from a man he meets at the docks to securing his wife after a card game and squaring up to arch-rival Casanova, this is Cagliostro’s apologia, a chance to set the record straight.
One of the key lessons when putting together a new show is to never assume the audience has the same knowledge or deep enthusiasm for the topic as the company. To many, Cagliostro’s story will be entirely unknown and McIver’s narrative structure doesn’t guide the audience through his experiences or significance as well as it could. Apologia opens with many minutes of dance and movement, followed by a launch into a boyhood scene where the young Alessandro is caught as a pickpocket. Yet, what the audience really need at the start is some context, either a statement that Cagliostro is a maligned figure which explains his importance or a flash forward to a later scene – perhaps a high point entertaining the great and the good, or a preview of the ending at his lowest ebb – something to give the show traction and drive.
Next, the purpose of drama is to show not tell, so when adapting books or research materials then the content must use theatrical tools to present their various plot points, homing in on the key moments and important themes so that every word of dialogue is wholly in service of the play’s purpose. Apologia is quite a talky experience, the character of Cagilostro speaks of meeting Catherine the Great or cavorting in London, but the audience never sees any of these moments. Instead, much of the dialogue feels improvised or uncertain, staging scenes of his wife Serafina playing cards with a flirty Casanova as the men argue about who is telling the truth but the narrative gets stuck in reciting facts instead of acting them out, so much so that it is never easy to tell exactly what Cagilostro was actually famous for.
Finally, always be sure who or what the focus of the story is and what is the end goal; are multiple characters needed and are they all fully fleshed out, or could this story be told as a monologue with a single actor recreating other roles? In what is advertised as Cagilostro’s apologia it spends almost more time examining Serafina’s behaviour as a sulky flirt and, like history itself, is also wooed by Casanova.
There are good things here, McIver has found an exciting personality ignored by history whose exploits seem to deserve restoration and there is potential Amadeus-like drama in the relationship with the contemporary lothario, but as Apologia heads off for its next iteration, thinking more about the audience experience and the most appropriate dramatic structure will support its development.
Reviewed on 25 August 2024
