Eleanor Hadley Kershaw Enters Palace Grand
BY ELEANOR HADLEY KERSHAW REAL TIME MAGAZINE, 2008 The fourth wall is covered with a taut opaque material. In the centre is a square hole: we look into a small cube. Against the painted backdrop of this floating box – a snowy, mountainous Canadian landscape, in turn-of-the-19th century picturesque style – a thin man with a bushy beard, the tracker (Jonathon Young), opens a suitcase. In black boots, overcoat, black goggles and fedora, he is deliberate and exaggerated in movement, stooped yet graceful, part silent film comedian, part film noir private detective. He is a showman, a performer. The case is his recording device; he sets spools rolling within. He mimes to a voiceover of his own voice piped into the auditorium, as though speaking live. The voiceover mum bles as the tracker pushes fur onto a can attached to the end of a tripod slung over his shoulder. Aha! A boom microphone! He creeps around the miniature stage, picking up the sound of mosquitoes, wind, the crunching of snow, soundtrack and live action occur simultaneously, neither leading the other. “Cut that!”, the voiceover snaps. “And that.” “Leave that.” And, we are told, a distant roar (what is it?) contaminates Walker’s recordings. A white curtain drops to cover the miniature stage. An even smaller hole in the wall, on the left, is dimly lit. The same bearded man, now stripped down to thermal underwear, has cans over his ears: vintage headphones. His movement more subtle than before, he pulls plugs from a switchboard. No longer performer, he is now facilitator. Techie. Operator. Silent listener. We hear the same voiceover: “Cut that.” He pulls out a plug and the buzzing of mosquitoes disappears. “And that.” Another pin removed and the whistling of the wind is gone. The Operator dismantles the recording until all that is left is the previously imperceptible, ominous rumbling of the distant roar, somehow evocative of the emptiness of this northern territory. The voice tells us that there is an operator out there, receiving these signals and messages. The Operator snaps upright, as if his personal space has been invaded. The voice continues: there is nothing between man and outpost apart from the signal of the message. “I’m just letting him know that he still means something to somebody”. The voice begins to chuckle, and the Operator laughs too, happy with this acknowledgment, perhaps warped and manic. The terrified Operator frantically pulls out all the plugs but the laughter won’t stop. |
