It seems like an odd thing to say, given the alternative, but I paid attention to every second of Red Like Fruit. The script’s combination of compassion and intellectual rigor — ethical curiosity — demanded it.
As I received it, Red Like Fruit is about the ubiquity of violence against women and girls and how the pervasiveness of that violence makes it difficult to think beyond the terms of the cultural narrative that sustains it. I also think it’s about what you might call the fog of sex, the challenge of distinguishing between acceptable and unacceptable behaviours in encounters that might seem ethically equivalent, and identifying responsibility in situations in which virtually anyone might be accused of being an unreliable narrator.
Let’s ground this a bit.
At the top of Hanna Moscovitch’s 2024 script, Lauren and Luke introduce themselves. Lauren has asked Luke to narrate her story, so she sits in a chair on a raised platform while, downstage left, he recites a set of memories that Lauren has recorded.
We find out that Lauren is an investigative journalist who has been researching an article about a Liberal Party operative named Andrew who has been convicted of assaulting his partner, Brittany. Again and again, as Lauren interviews Andrew, Brittany, and characters who surround their story, Moscovitch flips and problematizes audience members’ sympathies and assumptions.
Lauren, who has just started group therapy at the beginning of her reminiscences, also begins to crack. The hard-to-identify unease she feels despite her apparently ideal life starts to speak its name.
Andrew’s crime was a physical assault. Lauren turns the focus onto sexual assault. It’s all gender-based violence.
Theatrically, I appreciate how successfully Moscovitch sustains tension. And I love how non-doctrinaire, yet ethically thorough her exploration is. Red Like Fruit is deeply feminist — and it refuses to take political shortcuts.
That said, there are times when Lauren asks Luke questions that all boil down to, “What’s the difference between this situation and this one?” or “Isn’t this all just normal?” — and the answers to those questions are always clear: in terms of the audience’s assignment, complexity leaves the room. But, in a way, this emphasizes the difficulty of Lauren’s struggle to find oxygen in a toxic culture.
The male narrator convention? Thankfully, the gender dynamics are not nearly as reducible as some might like them to be.
That said, the framing device does feel a bit off: when the characters break the scripted recitation, to engage in “spontaneous” dialogue, that dialogue is obviously not spontaneous, so the convention feels contrived.
Still, it’s always fascinating to witness Michelle Monteith’s performance as Lauren, emotions and the struggle for understanding registering subtly in her face and body. And, to me, it felt like David Patrick Flemming’s Luke was trying hard to behave responsibly, which is a tellingly liminal space to inhabit.
I’m rarely so thoroughly engaged at the theatre. My pal and I talked about Red Like Fruit all the way home. Even when we we’d been walking to our car, other people who had seen the show were diving into deep conversations on the sidewalk.
RED LIKE FRUIT by Hannah Moscovitch. Directed by Christian Barry. A 2b theatre production presented by The Cultch as part of the Warrior Festival. At the Historic Theatre on February 19. Continues until February 22. Tickets and information.
PHOTO CREDIT: Michelle Monteith in Red Like Fruit. (I believe the photo is by Riley Smith)
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