“The Blue Room,” a play by Arthur Schnitzler, is a provocative and suggestive play about people’s interactions with each other and the effect it has on their lives. It began its run on Thursday, November 16 and will continue to play at the Studio Theatre in the Silver Center for the Arts until Sunday, November 20.
Director Heather Hamilton stated, “This play is so existential. It is so much about isolation, about how we in-authentically define ourselves through our jobs, our roles, our social interactions, and how it never works. The characters in the play grasp at each other with the intent of defining themselves, and they must deal with the repercussions.”
“The Blue Room,” a show for mature audiences only, is a perpetual round robin of sexual encounters for the ten characters in the show, with one character from the previous scene staying and interacting in the scene that follows. The quest for acceptance, desire, love, lust and understanding of themselves and an attempt to understand the world around them, brings forth the need for such a journey to be had. While many will not admit to sleeping around, there are deep and un-adulterous emotions that are very prevalent in this play that brings the audience right into its very heart and soul.
The play is set up in scenes that seem to each have nothing to do with the next, but one actor from each previous scene returns for the next. As the play continues and the interaction between the characters becomes more intense, the tension only builds. The audience witnesses a cab driver with a prostitute, a prominent politician with a teenage model and a sophisticated aristocrat with a stage actress, just to list a few scenarios.
Throughout the play, the storyline lends leads the audience to believe that there should be an intense confrontation between the different characters that are sexually involved with several people, or that a jealous lover will burst onto stage and demand an explanation, keeping the audience on the edge of their seat. By the end, it’s so emotionally and sexually charged that at the end if you don’t need a cigarette, one might recommend that you check yourself for a pulse.
The story is expertly acted and is certainly worth the trip over to Silver. A provocative and suggestive tale, it raises emotions that occur within the deepest part of our human selves and forces us to recognize parts ourselves that we might not be entirely alright with identifying with. A fantastic way to spend an evening or an afternoon, “The Blue Room” is an intense show that aims to get at the rawest of human emotions.