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Accidental Death of an Anarchist 2023.6.24 Theatre Royal Haymarket 978-1-83904-254-6 |
很早以前看过孟京辉改编的《一个无政府主义者的意外死亡》，一点也记不得剧情了，导致我现在看西区新版的话剧，也说不出来到底剧情有哪些不一样。但是这个新改编的版本感觉非常不错，舞台的设计很简单却也很有现代感。结束的时候我在剧院还买到了这次改编版本的剧本，顺带着读了一遍，get到多一些现场语速太快没有听明白的笑点。
故事讲的是一个Maniac去到警察局，正好发现一个关于一个无政府主义者从警局窗户坠亡的案件的调查，他就假装调查的人去玩弄警察。中间还来了一个记者，Maniac就继续一边玩弄警察一边把真相推理出来。最后Maniac把所有人给制服了，一阵爆炸厌恶之后发现他也从警局窗户坠亡了。紧接着又来了一个和Maniac长的一模一样的自称是法官的人，说自己来调查无政府主义者的意外死亡案件，全剧终。
这部话剧本来是Dario Fo和Franca Rame在1970年的作品，50年之后再上演，在台词上可以很直观地发现很多现代元素地融入，比如Line of Duty，Elon Musk，ChatGPT，BLM等等。在剧本的最后，还截取了一段Maniac的台词，说这些台词可以按照实际情况进行精简选择。然后再看剧情，不知道原作的主旨是什么，现在的这个版本讲的就是police abuse。在现场演出的结尾，还在用投影列出来多少年来有多少这样的police abuse的案件持续发生。我感觉这样的主旨是不是有点太明确的，这个故事这是这么简单吗？
这部作品最有意思的地方就是这个Maniac角色的设定，他是一个疯子，结果他是最有条理最有逻辑的，而且他的逻辑还都能走得通，所以更显示了警方的可笑。一开始的时候他盘一遍正逻辑，就把警察们给吓死了。然后他再盘一遍反逻辑，如果可以让警察把自己的责任撇清、如果栽赃给死者等等，让警察一直跟着他的逻辑走。尽管起始方向是可笑的，但是走到最后是走不通的，逻辑还是带对了队，把真相给盘出来了。其中不乏Maniac的金句，每一句都好像是疯子的逻辑，大多数的时候是搞笑的，每一句却又都有一些真相的揭露和背后的思考。
随便摘录几段Maniac的台词，不管是站在疯子的角度，还是他在演
A good translation does not reproduce the source material word for word, it captures the essence, not the detail. And in the case of the Russian Embassy, the essence of every press release or communique is always ‘The accusation is outrageous and anyway you did it first…’
Well the initial inquiry is over, yes, but that wasn’t inquisitive enough, so now there’s an inquiry into that. It’s the British wat, of course. Inquiries into inquiries into inquiries for as long as it takes for everyone involved to destroy the evidence and change careers. If God were British, there wouldn’t be a Judgement Day, there’d be an eternal fucking inquiry.
Troubling? Surely it’s reassuring! When this ship goes down, these rozzas are the ones making sure you first-class passengers get all the lifeboats. For it is not free markets, it’s not Adam Smith’s ‘invisible hand’ that is safeguarding your way of life, it’s the very visible hand of the furious copper, hurtling towards the face of anyone who fancies something different.
Oh the actors change, of course, but the roles remain the same. I mean why do you think this case feels so eerily familiar? Why do you think an Italian train driver falling out of this window fifty-odd years ago still merits re-examination? Because it keeps bloody happening. Because these incidents are a bit too frequent to be ‘accidents. Because ‘a few bad apples’ may in fact be a sign of a bad tree. Because behind decades of ‘individual’ cases, from Stephen Lawrence to Chris Kaba, from spycops to Sarah Everard, there is a police force that cannot or will not reform; that employs, protects and even promotes racists, rapists, killers and bullies; that in the last ten years, of the eighteen hundred officers facing multiple misconduct charges, has fired just thirteen; and refuses to even admit that there’s a problem until it gets caught.
Tag: Dario Fo, Franca Rame, Tom Basden, Daniel Rigby, Daniel Raggett,