Schwarz, an actor, is an elegant speaker, and the pair’s conversational dynamic is easy to lean into, especially when van Velzen accompanies on piano. The show’s 100-minute runtime flies by and is clearly just a sliver of hundreds of stories the young theatremakers are eager to tell: they make a number of asides about sections that have been cut, side characters who could’ve filled hours on their own and documents too upsetting to read onstage.
Before the audience can take their seats, the duo greets each member with a questionnaire, party horn and passport-like document. While a lot of this piece is endearing, some parts could do with smoothing out. Core questions are asked about the ethics of archiving, which are engaging, but mostly left until the end. With a little extra wiggle room, the tactile moments would land with even more resonance, such as the near-identical forms from the war, the audience fingerprinting their passports and Schwarz inviting three spectators onstage to share a rug the size of a single transport camp bed.
However rough around the edges, the result is an intimate yet urgent portrait that interrogates the pursuit of truth and memory in today’s scarily familiar climate. That we are left with so much to ponder is the point; this play shows how reading between the lines can lead to a kind of justice.
By Maia Kahn
A Court of Paper appeared at Camden People’s Theatre, London, NW1 2PY. Tuesday 4 – Friday 7 November.
