New Speak: Re-Imagined, Episode Three, Review

 

New Speak: Re-Imagined, Episode Three, Review
By Conor O’Neill

Watchers, viewers, readers, all and sundry; critics, misfits and all without a category. These 24 minute, maybe a fraction less or a fraction more, four episodes are coming to a dramatic climax; it’ll be sad to see them end.

If you’ve been here or there from the start, you too will have evolved as this situation has engulfed and happily embraced/disgraced our lives. I wonder if those involved have been sitting, stirring into the mercury and foreseen the future. There does seem to be a feel of ‘These are too on the ball’… ‘These have been in my confessional box’ or ‘I’ve been hacked?’

Simple truth is, they had the smarts enough to know enough what was on the menu; agenda; second guessed the powers that be. And thank all the gods that come to your tongue they have.

What was a reworking of Orwell’s 1984, has indeed been re-imagined. Though this time not as fiction from the mind of Eric Blair back in 1948, but the keen eyes of five special acts. Not special as in they are part of an illuminati, just those with an eye drawn toward the simplicity of WTF is going on.

Same line up as episodes one and two: different run of appearance here and there, none to the detriment of this week’s instalment.

First up is Lata. Written and performed by the woman herself. An Eastern view on our little peace-wall squabbles, Troubles, territorial pissings and one-up-man-ships. A simple joy of Bollywood turns to a fractured run to the shops: New Speak indeed. We’re treated to her – and I had to Google this – Hindi sentences as again she acts her mother’s condemning tone, ‘All four feet 11 of her’ has Lata literally shitting her pants in recollection of the scene.

Try saying, ‘Keyon thenoo sharun andee ay, saday kupardy paakay’ in our northern brogue and make it sound lyrical? There ya go. See you can’t. You sound like a twit. Lata Sharma’s contribution to this series has series has opened my and hopefully your eyes too.

Put that phone down. Though barely possible at the moment, family gatherings in this mobile age are usually just a collection of people with similar genes looking to see whose ‘liked’ their latest tweet or post. This is the theme of dancer Zara Janahi’s performance. Trying to write about dance, is, to me like trying to knit with clouds. Yet, the message is loud and clear.

As with episode two, we find her in a park, a marionet with a satellite pulling the strings, only the magnetic force of the anchor phone holds her to the ground and down. Again, twisting, the music is relentless. Voice over states: “We have a finite existence, a set number of days… give people our love, not a like” Paraphrasing there, but the message holds as true as the dance.

And we’re onto The Great British Lockdown… enter the era of the clowns: rolling eyeballs, these two are a geg. A Hitchcock knife wielding scene, a tent for one and yet again Rebecca is at her wits end. Worry not Graham, a Deliveroo will see you through. Ukuleles: a disturbing introduction of trying to make it on modern platforms; just watch and laugh.

I knew this was where this was going. Just possibly the best piece of the series thus far. Real Talk’s man without a name, which he tries to offer but is too far gone to give a flying duck about… That little growth of hair on the face has turned to a man with a drink problem and an eight-day shadow, or is it the Party? Operating live, without the permission of the level fours. That’s for other people, the elite.

He’s in his own room 101. Timmy Mallet has been sledge-hammered into a Castle Street, dirty-vested Bruce Willis. Actor Patrick McBrearty really flies on this one. Nothing as special as seeing an evangelist turning to turning tricks. Knock, Knock.

In my last review I was maybe a tad harsh on singer/songwriter Katie Richardson. Thought it was a tad Dido. This episode the song is more upbeat. Back are dancers Ryan O’Neill and Vasaliki Stansinaki, this time the forest is green, exuberant and keeping with the beat and thump of the tune.

Hats off to producer George Sloan, The Edge Of The World is a fine fitting to the penultimate show of this great wee run by the Lyric and New Speak.

Stay safe, donate generously.

This Friday sees the end of the run. Hopefully your and my generosity will see more of this.

ENDS