Sargent & Victor & Gillian & Theresa & Me

Because school has kept me too busy to keep up with wrestling (and because I have a blog assignment to write here), we’ll be postponing WWE talk again this week to discuss a new one-woman play entitled Sargent & Victor & Me.

Debbie Patterson, the one woman, plays multiple characters based on interviews with real people from Winnipeg, people familiar with the intersection of Sargent and Victor. For the most part, the act works. Patterson mimics the voices of each character, and some impressions are so vivid, from her gestures to her tone, she almost transforms. This is particularly true with the character of Theresa, an aboriginal teenage prostitute, who Patterson skillfully portrays to tell the girl’s tragic story.

However, some characters don’t quite work, as Patterson pulls off an “old fogey” voice no better than anyone you might pick at random off the street. Sometimes it was just too hard to suspend my disbelief, and her acting occasionally came across as silly.

Sillier still were the vaguely spiritual dances Patterson sluggishly performed to transition between scenes and accompany newscasts. The production team admitted to the audience after the show that they didn’t know what to do during these segments, and it was obvious. The apparent solution was to just let Patterson wiggle around for a bit.

It was also difficult at times to discern which character Patterson was playing, especially early on when the audience wasn’t familiar with anyone yet. There were lighting cues, some more distinct than others, to differentiate characters, but one couldn’t recognize these cues until later when they started repeating.

Every so often, Patterson would channel her inner Gollum from The Lord of the Rings, talking to herself to further confuse matters. There were enough rapidly changing characters to complicate things without them speaking to each other in one body.

Speaking of the body, Patterson and the character she embodies, Gillian, have multiple sclerosis. Gillian’s segments were the strongest bits of the play, combining bawdy humour with poignant monologues about living with the disease. Much of Gillian seemed like a caricature of the frustrations related to MS, a way for Patterson to exaggerate her own emotions, and it worked.

The small set, designed to resemble a food bank, allowed Patterson to move around, with objects like tables and chairs for support. The play probably wouldn’t have worked without a set structured to make her movements easier.

The sound, however, was an issue for me. While some of the piano music was wonderful, other music was little more than feedback, or the screeching of some unidentified stringed instrument that may have been a guitar or a violin. I’m guessing those sounds were meant to accentuate Gillian’s pain and anxiety or something, but they were just…irritating. So despite some pleasant piano, I felt the sound detracted from Patterson’s performance instead of complementing it.

I don’t watch plays often, but a few months ago I saw Social Studies at Prairie Theatre Exchange, a play about a dysfunctional white family that takes in a Sudanese refugee. Because that play had four performers, the pace was much faster, with characters playing off each other to deliver jokes and keep the energy in the room high. By comparison, Sargent & Victor & Me was methodical and deliberate, which hurt and helped it.

It hurt it because the performer was extremely limited. She was one woman with MS, and she needed to command the audience’s attention at all times. Unlike in Social Studies, there was nothing else to consider, no one else to look at, so when a particular moment was weak, it was obvious. In a band, one occasionally squeaky clarinet doesn’t stand out as much as it would during a solo performance. Every mistake is just that much more pronounced.

It helps, though, because every success is that much more impressive. The two greatest successes in the story, the characters of Theresa and Gillian, especially stood out, and their stories definitely affected me the most.

Knowing Theresa’s tale was real, and having a family member who lived through similar events, I felt her story was important to hear, even if was at times difficult to hear. If it was just a character in a play, I might not have cared so much, but it seemed to me like Patterson really tried to portray Theresa accurately and fairly, and it showed in the way she delivered her lines and became the character.

As affecting as Theresa’s story was, though, I was definitely moved the most by Gillian’s story. I don’t have MS, and I certainly hope I never do, but I do know what it’s like to feel useless and depressed. My hurdles are more mental than physical, but the things Gillian was saying were like some of the thoughts I’ve had before. So seeing Gillian’s journey and redemption, and knowing Patterson’s similar circumstances, I had an unexpectedly strong emotional reaction.

I came into the play never believing I’d be moved by one woman pretending to be her brother—but I came out hopeful and somewhat inspired. The themes of human resiliency and the desire for change resonated with me, and the play encouraged me to strive toward my own betterment. Put simply, Sargent & Victor & Me taught me to focus on what I can do, not what I can’t do.