A sell-out, returns-only run for physical theatre/dance company DV8 that ends at the Lyttelton tonight sees the National acting as a receiving house rather than a producing one for a change, but producing something else radical instead: a stretching of the parameters of the kind of theatre that the building is there to embrace, and a corresponding stretching of the audience that comes to it (whether of DV8’s established fan base who may not usually venture to the National but might more typically be found at the Place or Queen Elizabeth Hall next door, or of the National’s more regular constituency whose own tastes might be tested and expanded in the process).
Seeing their exhilaratingly playful and at times achingly beautiful new piece Just for Show (and the astonishing technical proficiency of its melding of video and live action that literally become one at times), I found that it’s themes of theatrical illusion and life-sustaining self-delusions are perfectly mirrored, so to speak, just across the river at the Playhouse Theatre right now in Pirandello’s As You Desire Me.
It’s thrilling, too, that the National is becoming a receptive home to seriously different kinds of theatre making like this. As barriers are increasingly tumbling down, anyway, between different genres, the National can no longer simply be a place for the well-made play; it’s there for well-made theatre of any kind, and DV8’s show is exceedingly well-made.
