Worldstage Theatre & Co’s A Sleep of Prisoners makes for superb, compelling theater

Nowadays we are saturated with so much streaming programming, from Netflix and Amazon Prime to the other seemingly countless content providers that, when we are given the opportunity to watch a play of the quality and depth of Christopher Fry’s A Sleep of Prisoners onstage, it does something rare these days. It makes us see differently. It is clear from the very start of the performance, Worldstage Theatre & Co have made themselves at home, and, as directed by Jenny Leonhardt, have both intentionally and artistically embraced the theatre space to execute a deep and moving play.

From the moment the lights go up, our eyes look onto a simple set that depicts a church converted to a prison, holding four soldiers dressed in plain uniform during a war. As our eyes absorb the full visual content of both set and cast, we come to know that this play is not about the superficialities of life, but instead addresses essential human experience which is revealed in times of war.

The focal point of the set is a beautiful stained glass window (painted by artist and eurythmist Dana Williams) hanging on the back curtain of the stage with planes of glass shattered by artillery fire. This focal point embodies visually in a single image the deep contrast which constitutes basic and essential human experience: Human beings can strive to connect with the divine through religious worship and they can also strive to destroy each other through violence. In the play, such contrast is further embodied in the unique nature of each of the four soldiers, who are revealed through Fry’s masterful use of language. The play is written in poetic verse and this uncommon use of language, to the modern ear, makes us hear differently. The characters use words in a way that demands we pay particular attention, which is very different from the common use of language ubiquitous in our online-streaming culture today.

So, through heightened senses, we are drawn into an intensely emotional conflict between two of the lead characters, Private David King (Andrew Vogel) and Private Peter Able (Ian Elrick), whose contrasting natures drive them to contend with their predicament as prisoners of war differently. Dave lives with his feet planted solidly on the Earth; he is a fighter who very much seizes hold of his body which causes him to struggle with his imprisonment. Pete lives with his head turned to the sky, as a dreamer who more easily imagines himself outside of his body which obscures from him his dire situation as a prisoner of war. The action arising through the dueling natures of Dave and Pete reaches a climax when Dave tries to strangle Pete out of sheer desperation, but the genius of Fry’s play does not remain at the level of what the set and the circumstances first reveal. The two are supported by two other prisoners, Private Tim Meadows (Oliver Fredin) and Corporal Joe Adams (Paul McCrillis), who intervene and guide the conflicted younger men.

As the characters fall asleep on stage, they dream and assume the role of characters from Old Testament stories (Cain and Abel, David and Absalom, Abraham and Isaac, and Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in the fiery furnace). The play enters a deeper level by weaving Old Testament stories into dream sequences where the soldiers’ natures are mirrored by the natures of biblical characters. This departure into the dream realm, where biblical passages become dramatized, has two effects. First, the audience feels they are plunged into the subconscious mind of the characters which put the audience in direct contact with the primal human impulses that drive these characters. The audience further knows that dreams offer an unfiltered path to the inner life of human desires and the play draws on this. Secondly, Western civilization generally knows the Old Testament to be a chronicle of a people stretching through centuries. The content of the Old Testament is archetypal and the play uses this content to imbue the play with a deeply historical and spiritual dimension. (Even for modern audiences who are less familiar with the Old Testament than Fry’s audiences in 1951, the archetypal nature of the content is nonetheless felt.)

What is the consequence of the play’s narrative structure? On the one hand, we experience a real intimacy between the characters because we are in touch with their primal human impulses and desires. With Dave and Pete playing Cain and Abel, respectively, for example, we have two brothers incarnate in the flesh, but in very different ways. We know Dave and Pete from the first level of the play. The struggle between them is visceral. On the other hand, we are watching the reenactment of an Old Testament story which projects a spiritual and historic dimension into their action and words. There is a similar effect between the intimate struggles between a father and a son, but, in this case, the father is King David and his son is Absalom. There is the interplay between levels throughout the reenactment of all the Old Testament passages. There is something intimate and emotionally visceral, while at the same time mythical and archetypal.

This is what makes for great dramatic work: the audience is carried from the individual and specific to the universal and general. In other words, the work becomes transcendent. Worldstage Theater’s production of A Sleep of Prisoners achieves transcendence, and we have been graced by witnessing theater arts at their finest.

Review by Matt Kenyon, PhD physicist, NASA JPL (March 17, 2023)