(Cover Photo: The CAST of David Greig's "TOUCHING THE VOID" now playing at Apollinaire Theatre Company in Chelsea, MA. through May 26, 2024. Photo Courtesy: Danielle Fauteux Jacques)

By Kevin T. Baldwin

METRMAG Reviewer

# 774-242-6724

“I don't really have a second name, or at least, Joe could never remember it."

                       - ("Richard") / David Greig 

Apollinaire Theatre Company  

Presents David Greig's

"TOUCHING THE VOID"

Written by David Greig

Based on the book by Joe Simpson

Directed by Danielle Fauteux Jacques

Cast Includes: Patrick O’Konis as "Joe," Kody Grassett as "Simon," Parker Jennings as "Sarah," Zach Fuller as "Richard"

Additional Creative Team:

Stage Manager - Kaleb Perez; Assistant Stage Managers - Miguel Dominguez, Shelove Duperier; Scenic and Sound Design - Joseph Lark-Riley; Costume Design -  Elizabeth Rocha; Lighting Design - Danielle Fauteux Jacques. 

Chelsea Theatre Works, 189 Winnisimmet Street, Chelsea, MA. 02150 

Performances:

April 19, 2024 through May 26, 2024

(Contact Box Office for Exact Times)

TICKETS:

Reserve your tickets today!

Tickets can be purchased online or by calling # 617-887-2336 or via email at tickets@apollinairetheatre.com 

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COVID 19 PROTOCOLS

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Apollinaire Theatre Company has staged the exceedingly inventive nail-biter "TOUCHING THE VOID" which is not only a remarkable drama - it is a gripping tale of survival told in a fascinatingly creative way.

Written by David Greig and based on Joe Simpson’s 1988 international bestselling memoir, "TOUCHING THE VOID," which was also a BAFTA-winning film, charts Simpson's struggle to survive treacherous conditions injured while on the perilous Siula Grande mountain in the Peruvian Andes.

There are certain activities people do that become obsessive which others simply cannot comprehend...activities such as golfing, pickleball, comicon cosplay, "Dungeons and Dragons," theatre, etc.  

Few are more risk-taking and death-defying than mountain climbing.

While there are many who will never come close to understanding why these daredevils do what they do...this staging of "TOUCHING THE VOID" is so creative, using every part of the surrounding space to depict Simpson's actual 1985 ordeal, it comes damn close to making it at least a little more understandable.

(Photo: Zach Fuller as "Richard" and Patrick O’Konis as "Joe" in a scene from David Greig's "TOUCHING THE VOID" now playing at Apollinaire Theatre Company in Chelsea, MA. through May 26, 2024. Photo Courtesy: Danielle Fauteux Jacques)

The four actors who appear in this ensemble achieve new heights themselves for taking on the arduous physical tasks nearly from the beginning of the play.

You may not believe you are actually in the mountains with them but, thanks to Greig's ingenious script, you will walk away with a better understanding of the intense 'high' (pun intended) that comes with it and of which Simpson and others experience every time they venture out on that next big climb.

Greig's adaptation of "TOUCHING THE VOID" premiered at the Bristol Old Vic in 2018 and transferred to the Duke of York's Theatre in London's West End.

Greig is a multi-award-winning playwright and the Artistic Director of the Royal Lyceum Edinburgh. 

According to a press release, "TOUCHING THE VOID" is Apollinaire Theatre Company's  third production of a David Greig play, following "The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart" in 2019 (Elliot Norton Award for Outstanding Ensemble) and "MidSummer" in 2015. 

(Photo: The CAST of David Greig's "TOUCHING THE VOID" now playing at Apollinaire Theatre Company in Chelsea, MA. through May 26, 2024. Photo Courtesy: Danielle Fauteux Jacques)

Before the show even begins, as one looks around the Chelsea Theatre Works space, what is noticed is a plethora of junky antique wooden furniture, barely any of it matching. 

However, it does not matter, because the furniture is not merely there to serve as decoration nor depict a time and place.

This furniture slowly becomes the Siula Grande mountain region and other dangerous rock formations that these risk-takers find themselves inexplicably drawn to. 

Much of this furniture gets flipped upside down or sideways, tossed around, battered and bruised...much like reality.

Some of the furniture may not even likely 'survive' the performance - either a nod to (or at least a slight, intentional metaphor for) Simpson's own grueling experience. 

One section of the theatre space has been cut off, transformed into the Siula Grande mountain in the Peruvian Andes.

Okay, it's actually a bunch of seats covered in a big tarp - but let your imagination work a bit here and you won't be disappointed.

Parker Jennings is terrific as Joe's sister, "Sarah" and, as the first act begins, Sarah is attending a "wake" for her brother, Joe (Patrick O’Konis), presumed dead after a climbing incident.

Sarah's character serves as our "POV"- or at least the perspective of those of us in the audience who might be asking similar questions in trying to understand the extent of the climbing obsession as shared by her brother and others.

(Photo: Kody Grassett as "Simon" and Patrick O’Konis as "Joe" in a scene from David Greig's "TOUCHING THE VOID" now playing at Apollinaire Theatre Company in Chelsea, MA. through May 26, 2024. Photo Courtesy: Danielle Fauteux Jacques)

Sarah meets Joe's climbing partner, "Simon," (Kody Grassett) and another climbing companion (a self-described "armchair mountaineer"), artist and writer, "Richard" (Zach Fuller).

Fuller is masterful as our comic relief in many ways but Richard also serves to fill in on some of the narrative "gaps' or when information about climbing itself is required. 

Sarah asks the questions all non-comprehending non-climbers might ask: 

"Why? Why climb? Why risk your life repeatedly and so recklessly?"

The climbers advise her of quote made famous by George Mallory - the late George Mallory - "Because it's there." 

Fun fact: During a 1924 climbing expedition, Mallory and his climbing partner disappeared on the Northeast Ridge of Mount Everest.

So, this response proves unacceptable to Sarah, still grieving the loss of her brother.

Yet, it prompts the other two to take the play into a whole new direction and one which will completely hold our attention so much you will wonder why there is an intermission.

(Photo: Parker Jennings as "Sarah" and Patrick O’Konis as "Joe" in a scene from David Greig's "TOUCHING THE VOID" now playing at Apollinaire Theatre Company in Chelsea, MA. through May 26, 2024. Photo Courtesy: Danielle Fauteux Jacques)

O’Konis and Grassett are completely in sync with one another as the climbing partners Joe and Simon, whose only real personal connection is this single activity for which they share an unrelenting obsession.

As Joe slips down an ice cliff, he breaks his right leg and becomes incapacitated, with Simon attempting a near impossible rescue.

Simon, tethered to the injured Joe, pummeled by icy winds and at risk himself of being killed, makes the heart-wrenching decision to cut the rope.

The entire technical team deserves enormous praise for their precision timing as required for the multitude of lighting and sound cues occurring throughout the show.

As impeccably staged by director Danielle Fauteux Jacques, the play figuratively - if not literally - leaves you with a cliffhanger of a moment at the end of Act One and, as the show resumes, takes a surprising turn at the start of Act Two.

"TOUCHING THE VOID" is a completely remarkable piece which might look incredibly silly (if not utterly stupid) if it had been in lesser hands and not staged so skillfully and executed so brilliantly as done here.

"TOUCHING THE VOID" continues in Chelsea until May 26, 2024 and audiences will most likely leave the theatre with an equal sense of exhilaration and exhaustion thanks to the outstanding performances given by this adventurous quartet.

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Approximately two hours with one intermission.

Kevin T. Baldwin is a member of the American Theatre Critics Association (ATCA) 

@MetrmagReviews

@Theatre_Critics

ABOUT THE SHOW

Based on Joe Simpson’s bestselling memoir turned BAFTA-winning film, David Greig’s thrilling adaptation charts this astonishing feat ofhuman endurance.

Life-affirming and often darkly funny, "TOUCHING THE VOID" takes the audience on an epic adventure that asks how far you’d be willing to go to survive.

"David Greig finds humour amid the horror in this triumphant stage adaptation of the mountaineering memoir."- The Guardian 

ABOUT APOLLINAIRE THEATRE COMPANY 

APOLLINAIRE THEATRE COMPANY  is known for cutting-edge contemporary work, regional premieres, and for breathing new life into classics. We are proud recipients of multiple Elliot Norton and IRNE Awards, including The Kenneth A. MacDonald Award for Theatre Excellence awarded to Artistic Director Danielle Fauteux Jacques. We are also honored to have received the New England Theatre Conference Regional Award for Outstanding Achievement in the American Theatre.

APOLLINAIRE THEATRE COMPANY  

# 617-329-5350

atc@apollinairetheatre.com

www.apollinairetheatre.com