• Advertise
  • Request Review
  • Write for Us
  • Privacy
  • Login

Theatre Bubble

The UK Theatre Network

Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Cookie Policy
  • Reviews
  • News
  • Features
  • Spotlight
  • Opinions
  • Interviews
  • Guides
  • Tickets

The Pulverised at the Arcola

May 8, 2017 by Alison Goldie Leave a Comment

Review of: The Pulverised at the Arcola
Price:
£17/£14

Reviewed by: Alison Goldie
Rating:
4
On May 8, 2017
Last modified:May 9, 2017

Summary:

Harrowing testimonies from the globalised world flood through this powerful performance.

More Details

The Pulverised makes a statement from the off. Four characters lie spread out, bodies twisted, on a pile of rubble next to a forbidding concrete wall. Pounding music plays, and they rise and dance jerkily, faces contorted in pain. Then they begin to tell us about their lives, and for 90 minutes, their stories of the horrors of the modern globalized world are relentlessly communicated. This is not a comedy.

A Quality Assurance of Subcontractors Manager from Lyon flies the world, dropping into outposts of his multinational company for brief, ritualistic visits – China one day, India the next. He is so caught up in his efficient, box-ticking progress he only gradually notices his build-up of jet-lag, his disconnection from his family and the dehumanization of the workers he polices.

A factory worker in Shanghai, 16 years old, stands in a designated square metre of space, assembling TV boxes for consumption in France. There are only a limited number of toilet breaks available, so she daren’t succumb to normal bodily functions. She lives in a crowded dorm on site and spends her nights doing extra work for pin money.

A call centre Team Leader in Dakar, Senegal rises from the bed he shares with another underpaid worker and travels hours to his job, where he dons his fake Versace suit and chivvies the staff into speaking to customers like automatons, treading the company line to a fault, only breaking when a potential new recruit shows up his wage-slavery and submission to The Man.

A Research and Development Engineer in Bucharest, an executive, makes plenty of money but at the cost of time with her child at home, who she views from her desk on CCTV. When she doesn’t gain promotion, after working very hard for an interview in which her interlocutor falls asleep, her life and her hope in the future fall apart.

The Pulverised is a portrait of a world that has lost its heart. In the pursuit of profit, workers at various levels of multinational hierarchies become disassociated from normal human rhythms, their bodies merely dispensable cogs in the great machine. Intimate relationships are tortured until they’re destroyed. Connection with others is made via screens, and all co-workers are in competition, on an impossibly fast treadmill designed to make their company owners more market-share. We may have thought we knew the meaning of the term ‘rat-race’, but this piece of theatre makes the global connections that highlight how much worse than our understanding things really are.

Writer Alexandra Badea has crafted a brutal but essential play here, with a broad reach yet so many particularities that we can experience being under the skin of each benighted protagonist. Andy Sava directs with imagination and force, and the actors are strong, particularly Solomon Isreal as the call centre employee, who has a directness and nimble grace that are compulsively watchable. Audiences will have to search hard for hope, but The Pulverised is better for having no pat solutions to the gargantuan problems it illustrates – issues humanity clearly must address if it wants to work against the spoilage of all our lives by big business.

Author: Alison Goldie

Filed Under: Review Tagged With: Alexandra Badea, Arcola Theatre, Globalisation, The Pulverised

Join the discussion Cancel reply

INTERVIEW / Plain Heroines talks SCRATCHES at VAULT Festival 2023

We spoke to director Gabrielle Bird from Plain Heroines about taking part in VAULT Festival 2023 with their show SCRATCHES   Tell us [Read More]

INTERVIEW / Anthony Clark on SHE

Anthony Clark is the writer of SHE, a new show interweaving the stories of 14 different women in their twenties, [Read More]

INTERVIEW / Thick ‘n’ Fast talks General Secretary at VAULT Festival

We spoke to co-writers and performers Cassie Symes and Georgina Thomas about taking part in VAULT Festival 2023 with their [Read More]

NEWS / Too Much World at Once tour announced

Set against a backdrop of the climate crisis, the debut from Papatango shortlisted writer Billie Collins is a lyrical coming [Read More]

INTERVIEW / Ian Nicholas talks The Elephant Song

Ian Nicholas is a theatre producer, running OnBook Theatre alongside director Jason Moore. He talks here about their next production, [Read More]

Top Posts & Pages

  • Hotel- a new play by Polly Stenham at The Shed, National Theatre
  • Spotlight On: The London Clown Festival
  • London Clown Festival Coming to, well, London
  • Willy Hudson on Welcome Home
  • Athena Stevens on seeing what you’ve turned a blind eye to
  • Is this the real location of Ambridge?
  • Ed Fringe 2016: Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons at Summerhall Roundabout
  • Southwold Summer Theatre Season 2022
  • Interview with Theresa Heskins, co-director of "Astley's Astounding Adventures"
  • VAULT Festival unveils 2018 programme!
  • Alison Goldie
    Contributor

  • May 8th, 2017
  • comment iconNo Comments
  • FacebookTweetLinkedInEmail

    Newsletter

    Enjoyed what you've read? Get even more great content directly to your inbox - Completely Free

    About Theatre Bubble

    Theatre Bubble is the news, review and blogging site created by Blue Pie Media and run by a dedicated team of outstanding editors and writers: we're always looking for new contributors - to find out more click here.

    Contact Us

    News: news@theatrebubble.com
    Reviews: reviews@theatrebubble.com
    Website: webmaster@theatrebubble.com

    Privacy Policy

    Copyright © 2023 · Blue Pie Media

     

    Loading Comments...
     

      Share this ArticleLike this article? Email it to a friend!

      Email sent!