‘Icons/Idols: in the Purple Room’ (Review)

Entering the New Ohio Theatre to see a show seems strange and exciting. And although Icons/Idols: in the Purple Room is a political drama set in the eighth century Byzantium, it is difficult to separate the past from the present. The historical events overlaid with the design of the experience, largely prompted by COVID-19 safety protocols, create an eerie atmosphere and make you revise “theatre” as a concept. 

Photo courtesy of Byzantine Choral Project

This production combines a 40-minute soundtrack (book and lyrics by Helen Banner, music by Grace Oberhofer), and an immersive installation (design by Afsoon Pajoufar). Upon receiving the timed entry ticket confirmation, I also get a link to download the audio file to my cell phone. Using my headphones, I can listen to the choral drama, prompted to move from one part of the installation to the other (for those who wish, mp3 players and headphones are available at the door). There are no live performers in the space (save for a single “stagehand” who helps to navigate the space if anybody is confused). The entries are staggered, so at any given moment, there are only a handful of audience members wandering in the labyrinths of history.        

The story that unfolds is of the Byzantine empress Irene, and her life journey from a young orphan to the height of political power. Irene was brought to Constantinople by Constantine V to marry his son, Leo IV. This is where I, as an audience member, enter the story, descending the staircase leading to what normally would be the backstage but now is a hallway of a palace (there is also an accessible entrance). Floor-to-ceiling silk prints feature the black-and-white image of some ancient hall. The columns on the photograph rhyme visually with the columns in the theater. The craft paper runner leads to the towering “throne”, a red plastic chair atop a metal ladder, reminiscent of a lifeguard seat at the poolside. The eclecticism of the installation design is certainly stimulating but puzzling at times. 

The site of the next scene is a large bed covered with white sheets stained with blood (the childbirth of Constantine VI, the next in line for the throne, just took place here). There are two remote controls prominently placed on the bed. It is unclear whether they are put there intentionally or were left there by mistake after two TVs featuring a single, slowly blinking eye were turned on. Either way, this minor detail was quite noticeable in the minimalistic and carefully put together set and took me out of the moment. The stakes dropped once I was visually cued that it all might just be a TV melodrama. 

The historical events themselves are highly dramatic. The conflict between Irene and the male members of the royal family (first her father-in-law and her husband, then her son) revolves around the rivalry between iconophiles and iconoclasts. Irene, who is deeply connected to icons, first tries to pass this passion onto her younger son. However, she is discovered and punished by her husband by being separated from her child and practically imprisoned. Despite the personal trauma and the hostile atmosphere towards iconography in Byzantium, Irene continues her pursuit and will soon challenge the empire. She is not stopping even when her own son gets in the way of her vision.         

               

Icons/Idols, the first part of the Byzantine Choral Project, is full of blood-chilling horrors and passion crushing everything in its way. The emotional turmoils are conveyed beautifully in acapella choral singing by the voices of ten female and non-binary performers. The installation component, on the other hand, slows down the dynamic narrative, and I am still not sure whether it benefits the vocal performance. 

While the singing conveys raw passions, the installation looks like a cadaver of the past, held together by brown scotch tape. Some components of the visual design are stunning: for example, the large-scale fabric prints of the palace and the church, which looked triumphant and haunting, moving slightly as the few audience members were moving between them. So did the heavy velvet backdrop of the “purple room”. And even the bed, as a site of birth and death reads as an important visual dominant (minus the remote controls). But the brown tape generously used throughout the space made me cringe. Conceptually, it was probably referring to holding the Byzantine empire together. In reality, it looked messy and degraded the overall design concept. Thankfully, the bold and colorful lighting brought some edge to the visual design and held it together.                     

Execution aside, there is something haunting in the incongruity between the narrative unfolding chronologically in “real-time” and the non-linear trajectory of the movement through space, half-ruin, held together by inadequate means. It was also incredibly uncanny to see the familiar theater space transformed and to get disoriented. The entire experience, starting from entering New Ohio from where the actors normally would, and ending the show on the bleachers made me think of the future of the theatre-going: will it ever be the same? Most importantly, do we want it to be “the same”? Or should we follow the example of passionate Irene, who was able to seize the moment, changing the course of the entire Western civilization?