The play "movingly reveals the investment we make in inanimate things, their power to unsettle us, and how their talismanic qualities license new ways of seeing the world"Katie Woods

This 2006 play, adapted to a much shorter version for this performance, is a series of short vignettes, each based around a different object. These included a spade, a coffee cup, a camera, a bucket of water, a wedding ring, and a painting by Hans Holbein. The play "movingly reveals the investment we make in inanimate things, their power to unsettle us, and how their talismanic qualities license new ways of seeing the world."

While each vignette ostensibly centred around a different object and different characters, it feels rather a lot of the time like the audience is watching the same characters going through the same motions again and again and again. This repetition grew towards the end of the piece, so much so that I found myself wondering whether these were actually the same characters and it was all going to tie together at the end in some way.

"Direction was slick and the scenes moved quickly, and there were some truly excellent performances from all of the actors, particularly during monologue scenes"

However, judging from past reviews, this is a common problem with productions of this play and one which some directors get around by using casts of over a dozen actors. Unfortunately, with only three actors cast in this production, this posed some difficulties in terms of character variation. The acting and direction from actors Alex Franklin, Grace Etheredge, and Shimali de Silva and directors Eve Gatenby and Isabelle Higgins was commendable. Direction was slick and the scenes moved quickly, and there were some truly excellent performances from all of the actors, particularly during monologue scenes.

Unfortunately, the problem of playing the same characters over and over again ultimately marred their performance, although this problem is perhaps understandable given the unusually high amount of role switching, with each actor playing around ten different characters within the space of an hour.

"There were some truly excellent performances from all of the actors, particularly during monologue scenes"Katie Woods

The overriding impression of the costume, set, sound and lighting used was one of a blank canvas. The largely minimalist set with homely touches at either side, set up against the long rather than traditionally used short wall of Pembroke New Cellars, was used and re-used for different scenes in interesting ways. Perhaps particularly effective was the way in which each ‘object’ was left by the actor in its final resting place of the scene. Many objects finished their scenes broken, tossed aside or even ripped to shreds,and the litter of destruction built up a cumulative load of the weight of these individual stories, leaving a deep impression on the audience.

Neat and clever touches like these really elevated the performance overall and the use of projection and original sound really aided the performance. Designed by Comrie Saville-Ferguson as a means of scene transition, this was a good choice and well-executed, allowing for slick and stylish scene transitions whilst maintaining atmosphere and tension between vignettes.

But unfortunately, the overall ‘blank canvas’ approach, again, didn’t help the problem of repetition dominating this production. Without a change of costume or set, the audience’s sense of déjà vu became in some scenes quite overwhelming. This was, sadly, a problem which the actors also seemed to struggle with, due to the somewhat risky directorial decision for the actors to use the same (or very similar) voices and movements in different scenes, with generally only very slight tweaks for conditions such as age and social status.

Whilst, on the whole, executed well, one can’t help but shake the feeling that 13 Objects was perhaps a few objects too many