My play Whose Blood is now three weeks into its run, and yet it has taken me this long to fully understand its meaning. Only now that the play is in the hands of the director, actors, and technicians, do I fully see its power.
All theatre is an event (the event of people coming together to witness a story) but what makes Whose Blood so unusual is that it is being performed in an actual 19th Century Operating Theatre. The drama is therefore a recreation of what might have occurred there. The play tells the story of a couple in 1832 who face a difficult choice about a surgery, but what makes the play so unusual is that they are standing in the actual space where they would have made that decision.
I have come to fully realize that the play is not so much a play, as it is an event. It is the event of witnessing a story which blurs the line between past and present, history and reality. The actors bring to life a story that has remained hidden until now. The play is actually a rite or a ritual. It calls to life the stories of those whose blood lies in the floorboard on which we sit. I am proud to be a witness.
