Theatre Review: Through a Glass Darkly at Project Arts Centre, Dublin

3/5

Ingmar Bergman’s 1962 film about a young woman in the grip of mental disintegration has not aged as well as some of the director’s better films. This stage adaptation, written by Jenny Worton and produced by Corn Exchange, remains far too faithful to the tone of the original, resulting in a piece that, while bracing, feels weirdly dated and far too cerebral.

The narrative is set on an island retreat where neglectful father David (Peter Gowen) has gathered with his children, Karin (Beth Cooke) and Minus (Colin Campbell), and Karin’s doctor husband, Martin (Peter Gaynor).

A novelist of mediocre talent, David is tormented by his creative temperament. Alas, his sexually confused adolescent son also looks destined for the same fate.

Karin, meanwhile, has more intense demons still to contend with, including malign voices in her head. Her mental collapse is treated as something akin to the artistic compulsion, but which — in terms of its sheer transformative power — far surpasses it. (This idea of a spiritual quality inherent in mental decline is the play’s most intriguing element and director Annie Ryan does well to develop it without over-egging it.)

Sarah Bacon’s abstract set design is provocative. Its muted greys and whites suggest the hazy bliss of idyllic retreat and yet also the searing ‘grey matter’ of Karin’s interior decline.

Nevertheless, the set may be one reason why the production struggles to make Karin’s collapse as engaging as it could be. A set with a more rugged ‘realist’ quality would perhaps better emphasise the world from which Karin is alienated.

The production builds to a harrowing finale, with Cooke’s versatile performance arriving at a fierce emotional pitch by the finish.